G1PST SORCERT AND FORTUNE - TELLING 



GYPSY SORCERY 



FORTUNE TELLING 



ILLUSTRATED BY NUMEROUS INCANTATIONS, SPECIMENS OF 
MEDICAL MAGIC, ANECDOTES AND TALES 



CHARLES GODFREY LELAND 

PRESIDENT OF THE GIPSY- LORE SOCIETY, &C, &C. 



COPIOUSLY ILLUSTRATED BY THE AUTHOR 



NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 






2>e£>ication. 



THIS WORK 

IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED TO MY COLLEAGUES OF THE 

CONGRfes DES TRADITIONS POPULAIRES, 

HELD AT PARIS, JULY, 1 889 ; 

AND ESPECIALLY 

TO THE FRENCH MEMBERS OF THAT BODY, 

IN GRATEFUL REMEMBRANCE OF THEIR GENEROUS HOSPITALITY, 

AND UNFAILING KINDNESS AND COURTESY, BY 

CHARLES G. LELAND. 



Oift 

"W. L. Shoemaker 
[1 S '06 



CONTENTS. 



CHAP. PACE 

I. THE ORIGIN OF WITCHCRAFT, SHAMANISM, AND SORCERY. VINDICTIVE AND MISCHIEVOUS 

MAGIC I 

II. CHARMS AND CONJURATIONS TO CURE THE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. HUNGARIAN 

GYPSY MAGIC • • • • • • .12 

III. GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS THE CURE OF CHILDREN HUNGARIAN GYPSY SPELLS 

A CURIOUS OLD ITALIAN " SECRET " THE MAGIC VIRTUE OF GARLIC A 

FLORENTINE INCANTATION LEARNED FROM A WITCH LILITH, THE CHILD-STEALER, 

AND QUEEN OF THE WITCHES .......... 41 

IV. SOUTH SLAVONIAN AND OTHER GYPSY WITCH-LORE.— THE WORDS FOR A WITCH VILAS AND 

THE SPIRITS OF EARTH AND AIR WITCHES, EGG-SHELLS, AND EGG-LORE EGG 

PROVERBS OVA DE CRUCIBUS . . . . . . . . . .65 

V. CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS ..... 79 

VI. OF PREGNANCY AND CHARMS, OR FOLK-LORE CONNECTED WITH IT BOARs' TEETH AND 

CHARMS FOR PREVENTING THE FLOW OF BLOOD . . . . . . I OO 

VII. THE RECOVERY OF STOLEN PROPERTY LOVE-CHARMS SHOES AND LOVE-POTION6, OR 

PHILTRES . . . . . . . . . . . . ,I08 

I I II. ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES AND SUPERSTITIONS, CONNECTED WITH 

THOSE OF THE GYPSIES . . . . . . . . . . .122 

X. THE RENDEZVOUS OR MEETINGS OF WITCHES, SORCERERS, AND VILAS. A CONTINUATION 

OF SOUTH SLAVONIAN GYPSY-LORE ......... I42 

X. OF THE HAUNTS, HOMES, AND HABITS OF WITCHES IN THE SOUTH SLAVIC LANDS. 

BOGEYS AND HUMBUGS . . . . . . . . . . .152 

XI. GYPSY WITCHCRAFT.- — THE MAGICAL POWER WHICH IS INNATE IN ALL MEN AND WOMEN 
HOW IT MAY BE CULTIVATED AND DEVELOPED THE PRINCIPLES OF FORTUNE- 
TELLING ............. 162 

XII. FORTUNE-TELLING (continued). ROMANCE BASED ON CHANCE, OR HOPE, AS REGARDS THE 

FUTURE FOLK- AND SORCERY-LORE AUTHENTIC INSTANCES OF GYPSY PREDICTION I 86 

XIII. PROVERBS REFERRING TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES . . . . . 1 94 

XIV. A GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. HOKKANI BARO LELLIN DUDIKABIN, OR THE GREAT SECRET 

CHILDREN'S RHYMES AND INCANTATIONS TEN LITTLE INDIAN BOYS AND TEN 

LITTLE ACORN GIRLS OF MARCELLUS BURDIGALENSIS ...... 209 

XV. GYPSY AMULETS ............. 23O 

XVI. GYPSIES, TOADS, AND TOAD-LORE . . ... . . . . . -255 



PREFACE. 



HIS work contains a collec- 
tion of the customs, usages, 
and ceremonies current 
among gypsies, as regards 
fortune-telling, witch- 
doctoring, love - philtering, 
and other sorcery, illustrated 
by many anecdotes and in- 
stances, taken either from 
works as yet very little 
known to the English 
reader or from personal 
M experiences. Within a very 
few years, since Ethnology 
and Archaeology have re- 
ceived a great inspiration, 
and much enlarged their 
scope through Folk-lore, everything relating to such subjects is studied 
with far greater interest and to much greater profit than was the \ase 
when they were cultivated in a languid, half-believing, half-sceptical spirit 
which was in reality rather one of mere romance than reason. Now that 
we seek with resolution to find the whole truth, be it based on materialism, 
spiritualism, or their identity, we are amazed to find that the realm of 
marvel and mystery, of wonder and poetry, connected with what we 
vaguely call " magic," far from being explained away or exploded, enlarges 




x PREFACE. 

before us as we proceed, and that not into a mere cloudland, gorgeous 
land, but into a country of reality in which men of science who would 
once have disdained the mere thought thereof are beginning to stray. 
Hypnotism has really revealed far greater wonders than were ever established 
by the fascinatores of old or by mesmerists of more modern times. 
Memory, the basis of thought according to Plato, which was once held 
to be a determined quantity, has been proved, (the word is not too bold), 
by recent physiology, to be practically infinite, and its perfect development 
to be identical with that of intellect, so that we now see plainly before us 
the power to perform much which was once regarded as miraculous. Not 
less evident is it that men of science or practical inventors, such as Darwin, 
Wallace, Huxley, Tyndale, Galton, Joule, Lockyer, and Edison, 
have been or are all working in common with theosophists, spiritualists, 
Folk-lorists, and many more, not diversely but all towards a grand solution 
of the Unknown. 

Therefore there is nothing whatever in the past relating to the influences 
which have swayed man, however strange, eccentric, superstitious, or even 
repulsive they may seem, which is not of great and constantly increasing 
value. And if we of the present time begin already to see this, how much 
more important will these facts be to the men of the future, who, by virtue 
of more widely extended knowledge and comparison, will be better able 
than we are to draw wise conclusions undreamed of now. But the chief 
conclusion for us is to collect as much as we can, while it is yet extant, of 
all the strange lore of the olden time, instead of wasting time in forming idle 
theories about it. 

In a paper read before the Congres des Traditions populaires in Paris, 1889, 
on the relations of gypsies to Folk-lore, I set forth my belief that these people 
have always been the humble priests of what is really the practical religion 
of all peasants and poor people ; that is their magical ceremonies and 
medicine. Very few have any conception of the degree to which gypsies 
have been the colporteurs of what in Italy is called " the old faith," or 
witchcraft. 



PREFACE. xi 

As regards the illustrative matter given, J am much indebted to Dr. 
Wlislocki, who has probably had far more intimate personal experience of 
gypsies than any other learned man who ever lived, through our mutual 
friend, Dr. Anthon Herrmann, editor of the Ethnologische Mitteilungen, 
Budapest, who is also himself an accomplished Romany scholar and collector, 
and who has kindly taken a warm interest in this book, and greatly aided it. 
To these 1 may add Dr. Friedrich S. Krauss, of Vienna, whose various 
works on the superstitions and Folk-lore of the South Slavonians — kindly 
presented by him to me — contain a vast mine of material, nearly all that of 
which he treats being common property between peasants and the Romany, 
as other sources abundantly indicate. With this there is also much which 
I collected personally among gypsies and fortune-tellers, and similar 
characters, it being true as regards this work and its main object, that 
there is much cognate or allied information which is quite as valuable as 
gypsy-lore itself, as all such subjects mutually explain one of the others. 

Gypsies, as I have said, have done more than any race or class on 
the face of the earth to disseminate among the multitude a belief in 
fortune-telling, magical or sympathetic cures, amulets and such small 
sorceries as now find a place in Folk-lore. Their women have all pre- 
tended to possess occult power since prehistoric times. By the exercise 
of their wits they have actually acquired a certain art of reading character 
or even thought, which, however it be allied to deceit, is in a way true 
in itself, and well worth careful examination. Matthew Arnold has 
dwelt on it with rare skill in his poem of " The Gypsy Scholar." Even 
deceit and imposture never held its own as a system for ages without 
some ground-work of truth, and that which upheld the structure of gypsy 
sorcery, has never been very carefully examined. I trust that I have 
done this in a rational and philosophic spirit, and have also illustrated 
my remarks in a manner which will prove attractive to the general reader. 

There are many good reasons for believing that the greatest portion \ 
of gypsy magic was brought by the Romany from the East or India. I 
This is specially true as regards those now dwelling in Eastern Europe. / 



xii PREFACE. 

And it is certainly interesting to observe that among these people there 
is still extant, on a very extended scale indeed, a Shamanism which 
seems to have come from the same Tartar-Altaic source which was 
found of yore among the Accadian-Babylonians, Etruscan races, and 
Indian hill-tribes. This, the religion of the drum and the demon as a 

disease or devil doctoring — will be found fully illustrated in many 

curious ways in these pages. I believe that in describing it I have 
also shown how many fragments of this primitive religion, or cult, still 
exist, under very different names, in the most enlightened centres of 
civilization. And I respectfully submit to my reader, or critic, that I 
have in no instance, either in this or any other case, wandered from 
my real subject, and that the entire work forms a carefully considered 
and consistent whole. To perfect my title, I should perhaps have 
added a line or two to the effect that I have illustrated many of the 
gypsy sorceries by instances of Folk-lore drawn from other sources ; 
but I believe that it is nowhere inappropriate, considering the subject as 
a whole. For those who would lay stress on omissions in my book, I would 
say that I have never intended or pretended to exhaust gypsy superstitions. 
I have not even given all that may be found in the works of Wlislocki 
alone. I have, according to the limits of the book, cited so much as to fully 
illustrate the main subject already described, and this will be of more interest 
to the student of history than the details of gypsy chiromancy or more spells 
and charms than are necessary to explain the leading ideas. 

What is wanted in the present state of Folk-lore, I here repeat, is 
collection from original sources, and material, that is from people and 
not merely from books. The critics we have — like the poor — always 
with us, and a century hence we shall doubtless have far better ones 
than those in whom we now rejoice — or sorrow. But material abides 
no time, and an immense quantity of it which is world-old perishes 
every day. For with general culture and intelligence we are killing 
all kinds of old faiths, with wonderful celerity. The time is near at 
hand when it will all be incredibly valuable, and then men will wish 



PREFACE. xiii 

sorrowfully enough that there had been more collectors to accumulate 
and fewer critics to detract from their labours and to discourage them. 
For the collector must form his theory, or system great or small, good 
or bad, such as it is, in order to gather his facts ; and then the theory 
is shattered by the critic and the collection made to appear ridiculous. 
And so collection ends. 

There is another very curious reflection which has been ever present 
to my mind while writing this work, and which the reader will do well 
carefully to think out for himself. It is that the very first efforts of the 
human mind towards the supernatural were gloomy, strange, and wild ; 
they were of witchcraft and sorcery, dead bodies, defilement, deviltry, and 
dirt. Men soon came to believe in the virtue of the repetition of certain 
rhymes or spells in connection with dead men's bones, hands, and other 
horrors or " relics." To this day this old religion exists exactly as it did of 
yore, wherever men are ignorant, stupid, criminal, or corresponding to their 
prehistoric ancestors. I myself have seen a dead man's hand for sale in 
Venice. According to Dr. Block, says a writer in The St. James s Gazette , 
January 16, 1889, the corpse-candle superstition is still firmly enshrined 
among the tenets of thieves all over Europe. In reality, according to The 
Standard, we know little about the strange thoughts which agitate the minds 
of the criminal classes. Their creeds are legends. Most of them are the 
children and grandchildren of thieves who have been brought up from 
their youth in the densest ignorance, and who, constantly at war with 
society, seek the aid of those powers of darkness in the dread efficacy of 
which they have an unshaken confidence. 

" Fetishism of the rudest type, or what the mythologists have learned to call 'animism' 
is part and parcel of the robber's creed. A 'habit and repute' thief has always in his 
pocket, or somewhere about his person, a bit of coal, or chalk, or a 'lucky stone,' or an 
amulet of some sort on which he relies for safety in his hour of peril. Omens he firmly 
trusts in. Divination is regularly practised by him, as the occasional quarrels over the 
Bible and key, and the sieve and shears, testify. The supposed power of witches and wizards 
make many of them live in terror, and pay blackmail, and although they will lie almost 
without a motive, the ingenuity with which the most depraved criminal will try to evade 
' kissing the book,' performing this rite with his thumb instead, is a curious instance of what 



xiv PREFACE. 

may be termed perverted religious instincts. As for the fear of the evil eye, it is affirmed 
that most of the foreign thieves of London dread more being brought before a particular 
magistrate who has the reputation of being endowed with that fatal gift than of being 
summarily sentenced by any other whose judicial glare is less severe." 

This is all true, but it tells only a small part of the truth. Not 
only is Fetish or Shamanism the real religion of criminals, but of vast 
numbers who are not suspected of it. There is not a town in England 
or in Europe in which witchcraft (its beginning) is not extensively 
practised, although this is done with a secrecy the success of which is of 
itself almost a miracle. We may erect churches and print books, but 
wherever the prehistoric man exists — and he is still to be found every- 
where by millions — he will cling to the old witchcraft of his remote 
ancestors. Until you change his very nature, the only form in which he 
can realize supernaturalism will be by means of superstition, and the grossest 
superstion at that. Research and reflection have taught me that this 
sorcery is far more widely and deeply extended than any cultivated person 
dreams — instead of yielding to the progress of culture it seems to 
actually advance with it. Count Angelo de Gubernatis once remarked 
to one of the most distinguished English statesmen that there was in 
the country in Tuscany ten times as much heathenism as Christianity. 
The same remark was made to me by a fortune-teller in Florence. She 
explained what she meant. It was the vecchia religione — " the old religion " — 
not Christianity, but the dark and strange sorceries of the stregha, or witch, 
the compounding of magical medicine over which spells are muttered, 
the making love-philters, the cursing enemies, the removing the influence 
of other witches, ' and the manufacture of amulets in a manner prohibited 
by the Church. 

It would seem as if, by some strange process, while advanced scientists 
are occupied in eliminating magic from religion, the coarser mind is 
actually busy in reducing it to religion alone. It has been educated 
sufficiently to perceive an analogy between dead man's hands and " relics " 
as working miracles, and as sorcery is more entertaining than religion, and 
has, moreover, the charm of secrecy, the prehistoric man, who is still 



PREFACE xv 

with us, prefers the former. Because certain forms of this sorcery are no 
longer found among the educated classes we think that superstition no 
longer exists ; but though we no longer burn witches or believe in fairies, 
it is a fact that of a kind and fashion proportionate to our advanced 
culture, it is, with a very few exceptions, as prevalent as ever. Very 
few persons indeed have ever given this subject the attention which it 
merits, for it is simply idle to speculate on the possibility of cultivating or 
sympathizing with the lowest orders without really understanding it in all 
its higher forms. And I venture to say that, as regards a literal and 
truthful knowledge of its forms and practices, this work will prove to 
be a contribution to the subject not without value. 

I have, in fact, done my best to set forth in it a very singular truth 
which is of great importance to every one who takes any real interest in 
social science, or the advance of intelligence. It is that while almost every- 
body who contributes to general literature, be it books of travel or articles 
in journals, has ever and anon something clever to say about superstition 
among the lower orders at home or abroad, be it in remote country places 
or in the mountains of Italy, with the usual cry of " Would it be believed 
— in the nineteenth century ? " &c. ; it still remains true that the amount 
of belief in magic — call it by what name we will — in the world is just as 
great as ever it was. And here I would quote with approbation a passage 
from " The Conditions for the Survival of Archaic Customs," by G. L. 
Gomme, in The Archaeological %eview of January, 1890 : — 

"If Folk-lore has done nothing else up to this date it has demonstrated that civilization, 
under many of its phases, while elevating the governing class of a nation, and thereby no 
doubt elevating the nation, does not always reach the lowest or even the lower strata of the 
population. As Sir Arthur Mitchell puts it, ' There is always a going up of some and a 
going down of others,' and it is more than probable that just as the going up of the few is in 
one certain direction, along certain well-ascertained lines of improvement or development, 
so the going down of the many is in an equally well-ascertained line of degradation or back- 
wardness The upward march is always towards political improvement, carrying with it 
social development ; the downward march is always towards social degradation, carrying 
with it political backwardness. It seems difficult indeed to beiieve that monarchs like 
iElfrcd, Eadward, William, and Edward, could have had within their Christianized kingdom 



xvi PREFACE. 

groups of people whose status was still that of savagery ; it seems difficult to believe that 
Raleigh and Spenser actually beheld specimens of the Irish savage ; it seems impossible to 
read Kemble and Green and Freeman and yet to understand that they are speaking only of 
the advanced guard of the English nation, not of the backward races within the boundary of 
its island home. The student of archaic custom has, however, to meet these difficulties, and 
it seems necessary, therefore, to try and arrive at some idea as to what the period of savagery 
in these islands really means." 

Which is a question that very few can answer. There is to be found in 
almost every cheap book, or " penny dreadful " and newspaper shop in Great 
Britain and America, for sale at a very low price a Book of Fate — or some- 
thing equivalent to it, for the name of these works is legion — and one pub- 
lisher advertises that he has nearly thirty of them, or at least such books with 
different titles. In my copy there are twenty- five pages of incantations, 
charms, and spells, every one of them every whit as cc superstitious " as any 
of the gypsy ceremonies set forth in this volume. I am convinced, from 
much inquiry, that next to the Bible and the Almanac there is no one book 
which is so much disseminated among the million as the fortune-teller, in some 
form or other. 1 That is to say, there are, numerically, many millions more of 
believers in such small sorcery now in Great Britain than there were centuries 
ago, for, be it remembered, the superstitions of the masses were always petty 
ones, like those of the fate-books ; it was only the aristocracy who consulted 
Cornelius Agrippa, and could afford la haute magie. We may call it by 
other names, but fry, boil, roast, powder or perfume it as we will, the old 
faith in the supernatural and in " occult means of getting at it still exists 
in one form or another — the parable or moral of most frequent occurrence in 
it being that of the Mote and the Beam, of the real and full meaning of 
which I can only reply in the ever-recurring refrain of the Edda : " Under- 
stand ye this — or what ? 

1 I was once myself made to contribute, involuntarily, to this kind of literature. Forty 
years ago I published a Folk-lore bock entitled "The Poetry and Mystery of Dreams," in 
which the explanations of dreams, as given by Astrampsychius, Artemidorus, and other 
ancient oneirologists, were illustrated by passages from many poets and popular ballads, 
showing how widely the ancient symbolism had extended. A few years ago I found that 
some ingenious literary hack had taken my work (without credit), and, omitting what would 
not be understood by servant girls, had made of it a common sixpenny dream-book. 




CHAPTER I. 



THE ORIGIN OF WITCHCRAFT, SHAMANISM, AND SORCERY. 
AND MISCHIEVOUS MAGIC. 



-VINDICTIVE 




if we 



S their peculiar perfume is the 
chief association with spices, 
so sorcery is allied in every 
memory to gypsies. And as it 
has not escaped many poets 
that there is something more 
strangely sweet and mysterious 
in the scent of cloves than in 
that of flowers, so the attribute 
of inherited magic power adds 
to the romance of these pictur- 
esque wanderers. Both the 
spices and the Romany come 
from the far East — the father- 
land of divination and enchant- 
ment. The latter have been 
traced with tolerable accuracy, 
admit their affinity with the Indian Dom and Domar, back to the 

2 



2 GYPSY SORCERY. 

threshold of history, or well-nigh into prehistoric times, and in all ages they, 
or their women, have been engaged, as if by elvish instinct, in selling enchant- 
ments, peddling prophecies and palmistry, and dealing with the devil generally 
in a small retail way. As it was of old so it is to-day — 

Ki sha?i i Romani 
Adoi saii i chov'kani. 

Wherever gypsies go, 

There the witches are, we know. 

It is no great problem in ethnology or anthropology as to how gypsies- 
became fortune-tellers. We may find a very curious illustration of it in the 
wren. This is apparently as humble, modest, prosaic little fowl as exists, 
and as far from mystery and wickedness as an old hen. But the ornitholo- 
gists of the olden time, and the myth-makers, and the gypsies who lurked and 
lived in the forest, knew better. They saw how this bright-eyed, strange 
little creature in her elvish way slipped in and out of hollow trees and wood 
shade into sunlight, and anon was gone, no man knew whither, and so they 
knew that it was an uncanny creature, and told wonderful tales of its deeds 
in human form, and to-day it is called by gypsies in Germany, as in Eng- 
land, the witch-bird, or more briefly, chorihani, iC the witch." Just so the 
gypsies themselves, with their glittering Indian eyes, slipping like the wren 
in and out of the shadow of the Unknown, and anon away and invisible, won 
for themselves the name which now they wear. Wherever Shamanism, or 
the sorcery which is based on exorcising or commanding spirits, exists, its 
professors from leading strange lives, or from solitude or wandering, become 
strange and wild-looking. When men have this appearance people associate 
with it mysterious power. This is the case in Tartary, Africa, among the 
Eskimo, Lapps, or Red Indians, with all of whom the sorcerer, voodoo or 
medaolin, has the eye of the " fascinator," glittering and cold as that of a 
serpent. So the gypsies, from the mere fact of being wanderers and out-of- 
doors livers in wild places, became wild-looking, and when asked if they 
did not associate with the devils who dwell in the desert places, admitted 



THE ORIGIN OF WITCHCRAFT, SHAMANISM, AND SORCERY. 3 

the soft impeach merit, and being further questioned as to whether their 
friends the devils, fairies, elves, and goblins had not taught them how to tell 
the future, they pleaded guilty, and finding that it paid well, went to work in 
their small way to improve their " science," and particularly their pecuniary 
resources. It was an easy calling ; it required no property or properties, 
neither capital nor capitol, shiners nor shrines, wherein to work the oracle. 
And as I believe that a company of children left entirely to themselves 
would form and grow up with a language which in a very few years would be 
spoken fluently, 1 so I am certain that the shades of night, and fear, pain, and 
lightning and mystery would produce in the same time conceptions of dreaded 
beings, resulting first in demonology and then in the fancied art of driving 
devils away. For out of my own childish experiences and memories I retain 
with absolute accuracy material enough to declare that without any aid from 
other people the youthful mind forms for itself strange and seemingly super- 
natural phenomena. A tree or bush waving in the night breeze by moon- 
light is perhaps mistaken for a great man, the mere repetition of the sight or 
of its memory make it a personal reality. Once when I was a child powerful 
doses of quinine caused a peculiar throb in my ear which I for some time 
Delieved was the sound of somebody continually walking upstairs. Very 
young children sometimes imagine invisible playmates or companions talk 
with them, and actually believe that the unseen talk to them in return. I 
myself knew a small boy who had, as he sincerely believed, such a companion, 
whom he called Bill, and when he could not understand his lessons he con- 
sulted the mysterious William, who explained them to him. There are 
•children who, by the voluntary or involuntary exercise of visual perception 
or volitional eye-memory, 2 reproduce or create images which they imagine 

1 Vide an extremely interesting paper on "The Origin of Languages and the Antiquity 
of Speaking Man," by Horatio Hale. [" Proceedings of the American Association for the 
Advancement of Science," vol. xxv.] As I had, owing to studies for many years of baby- 
talk and jargons, long ago arrived at Mr. Hale's conclusions, I was astonished to learn that 
.they have been so recently formed by anybody. 

2 Vide "Practical Education," by C. G. Lcland (London : Whittaker and Co., 1888), 
in which this faculty is fully discussed, pp. 184-213. 



4 GYPSY SORCERY. 

to be real, and this faculty is much commoner than is supposed. In fact I 
believe that where it exists in most remarkable degrees the adults to whom 
the children describe their visions dismiss them as " fancies " or falsehoods. 
Even in the very extraordinary cases recorded by Professor Hale, in which 
little children formed for themselves spontaneously a language in which they- 
conversed fluently, neither their parents nor anybody else appears to have 
taken the least interest in the matter. However, the fact being that babes 
can form for themselves supernatural conceptions and embryo mythologies, 
and as they always do attribute to strange or terrible-looking persons power 
which the latter do not possess, it is easy, without going further, to under- 
stand why a wild Indian gypsy, with eyes like a demon when excited, and 
unearthly-looking at his calmest, should have been supposed to be a sor- 
cerer by credulous child-like villagers. All of this I believe might have 
taken place, or really did take place, in the very dawn of man's existence as 
a rational creature — that as soon as " the frontal convolution of the brain 
which monkeys do not possess," had begun with the "genial tubercule,"' 
essential to language, to develop itself, then also certain other convolutions 
and tubercules, not as yet discovered, but which ad interim I will call " the 
ghost-making," began to act. " Genial," they certainly were not — little joy 
and much sorrow has man got out of his spectro-facient apparatus — per- 
haps if it and talk are correlative he might as well, many a time, have been 
better off if he were dumb. 

So out of the earliest time, in the very two o'clock of a misty morning 
in history, man came forth believing in non-existent terrors and evils as 
soon as he could talk, and talking about them as fast as he formed them. 
Long before the conception of anything good or beneficent, or of a Heavenly 
Father or benevolent angels came to him, he was scared with nightmares and 
spirits of death and darkness, hell, hunger, torture, and terror. We all 
know how difficult it is for many people when some one dies out of a house- 
hold to get over the involuntary feeling that we shall unexpectedly meet 
the departed in the usual haunts. In almost every family there is a record 
how some one has " heard a voice they cannot hear," or the dead speaking 



THE ORIGIN OF WITCHCRAFT, SHAMANISM, AND SORCERY. 5- 

m the familiar tones. Hence the belief in ghosts, as soon as men began to- 
care for death at all, or to miss those who had gone. So first of all came 
terrors and spectres, or revenants, and from setting out food for the latter,, 
which was the most obvious and childlike manner to please them, grew 
sacrifices to evil spirits, and finally the whole system of sacrifice in all its- 
elaboration. 

It may therefore be concluded that as soon as man began to think and 
speak and fear the mysterious, he also began to appease ghosts and bugbears 
by sacrifices. Then there sprung up at once — quite as early — the magus, or 
the cleverer man, who had the wit to do the sacrificing and eat the meats 
sacrificed, and explain that he had arranged it all privately with the dead and 
the devils. He knew all about them, and he could drive them away. This 
was the Shaman. He seems to have had a Tartar-Mongol-mongrel-Turanian 
origin, somewhere in Central Asia, and to have spread with his magic drum, 
and songs, and stinking smoke, exorcising his fiends all over the face of 
the earth, even as his descendant, General Booth, with his ' c devil-drivers "' 
is doing at the present day. But the earliest authentic records of Shamanism 
are to be found in the Accadian, proto-Chaldasan and Babylon records- 
According to it all diseases whatever, as well as all disasters, were directly 
the work of evil spirits, which were to be driven away by songs of exorcism, 
burning of perfumes or evil-smelling drugs, and performing ceremonies,, 
many of which, with scraps of the exorcisms are found in familiar use 
here and there at the present day. Most important of all in it was the 
extraordinary influence of the Shaman himself on his patient, for he made 
the one acted on sleep or wake, freed him from many apparently dire 
disorders in a minute, among others of epilepsies which were believed to 
be caused by devils dwelling in man — the nearest and latest explanation of 
which magic power is given in that very remarkable book, " Psycho- 
Therapeutics, or Treatment by Sleep and Suggestion," by C. Lloyd 
Tuckey, M.D. (London: Bailliere and Co., 1889), which I commend to 
all persons interested in ethnology as casting light on some of the most 
interesting and perplexing problems of humanity, and especially of " magic." 



6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

It would seem, at least among the Laplanders, Finns, Eskimo, and 
Red Indians, that the first stage of Shamanism was a very horrible witch- 
craft, practised chiefly by women, in which attempts were made to conciliate 
the evil spirits ; the means employed embracing everything which could 
revolt and startle barbarous men. Thus fragments of dead bodies and 
poison, and unheard-of terrors and crimes formed its basis. I think it very 
probable that this was the primitive religion among savages everywhere. 
An immense amount of it in its vilest conceivable forms still exists among 
negroes as Voodoo. 

After a time this primitive witchcraft or voodooism had its reformers 
— probably brave and shrewd men, who conjectured that the powers of evil 
might be "exploited" to advantage. There is great confusion and little 
knowledge as yet as regards primitive man, but till we know better we 
may roughly assume that witch-voodooism was the religion of the people 
of the paleolithic period, if they could talk at all, since language is denied 
to the men of the Neanderthal, Canstadt, Egnisheim, and Podhava type. 
All that we can declare with some certainty is that we find the advanced 
Shamanism the religion of the early Turanian races, among whose descen- 
dants, and other people allied to them, it exists to this day. The grandest 
incident in the history of humanity is the appearance of the Man of Cro- 
magnon. He it was who founded what M. de Quatrefages calls " a 
magnificent race," probably one which speedily developed a high civili- 
zation, and a refined religion. But the old Shamanism with its amulets, 
exorcisms, and smoke, its noises, more or less musical, of drums and 
enchanted bells, and its main belief that, all the ills of life came from the 
action of evil spirits, was deeply based among the inferior races and the 
inferior scions of the Cromagnon stock clung to it in forms more or 
less modified. Just as the earlier witchcraft, or the worship and conciliation 
of evil, overlapped in many places the newer Shamanism, so the latter 
overlapped the beautiful Nature-worship of the early Aryans, the stately 
monotheism of the Shemites, and the other more advanced or ingenious 
•developments of the idea of a creative cause. There are, in fact, even 



THE ORIGIN OF WITCHCRAFT, SHAMANISM, AND SORCERY. T 

among us now, minds to whom Shamanism or even witchcraft is deeply, 
or innately adapted by nature, and there are hundred of millions who, 
while professing a higher and purer doctrine, cling to its forms or 
essentials, believing that because the apparatus is called by a different 
name it is in no respect whatever the same thing. Finally there are men 
who, with no logical belief whatever in any kind of supernaturalism, study 
it, and love it, and are moved by it, owing to its endless associations 
with poetry, art, and all the legends of infancy or youth. Heine was 
not in his reasoning moments anything more or less than a strict Deist 
or Monotheist, but all the dreams and spectres, fairies and goblins, 
whether of the Middle Ages or the Talmud, were inexpressibly dear to 
him, and they move like myriad motes through the sunshine of his 
poetry and prose, often causing long rays when there were bars at the 
window — like that on which the saint hung his cloak. It is probable or 
certain that Shamanism (or that into which it has very naturally developed) 
will influence all mankind, until science, by absorbing man's love of the- 
marvellous in stupendous discoveries shall so put to shame the old thau- 
maturgy, or wonder-working, that the latter will seem poor and childish. 
In all the " Arabian Nights " there is nothing more marvellous than the new 
idea that voices and sounds may be laid aside like real books, and made 
to speak and sing again years afterwards. And in all of that vast repertory 
of occult lore, " Isis Unveiled," there is nothing so wonderful as the simple 
truth that every child may be educated to possess an infinitely developed 
memory of words, sights, sounds, and ideas, allied to incredible quickness 
of perception and practice of the constructive faculties. These, with the 
vast fields of adjusting improved social relations and reforms — all of which 
in a certain way opens dazzling vistas of a certain kind of enchantment 
or brilliant hope — will go fast and far to change the old romance to 
a radically different state of feeling and association. 

It is coming — let it come ! Doubtless there was an awful romance of 
darkness about the old witchcraft which caused its worshippers to declare 
that the new lights of Shamanism could never dissipate it. Just so many 



8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

millions of educated people at present cannot be brought to understand 
that all things to which they are used are not based on immutable laws 
of nature, and must needs be eternal. They will find it hard to 
•comprehend that there can ever be any kind of poetry, art, or sentiment, 
utterly different from that to which they and their ancestors have been 
accustomed. Yet it is clear and plain before them, this New Era, looking 
them directly in the face, about to usher in a reformation compared to 
which all the reformations and revolutions, and new religions which the 
world has ever seen were as nothing ; and the children are born who 
will see more than the beginning of it. 

In the next chapter I will examine the Shamanic spells and charms 
•still used among certain gypsies. For, be it observed, all the gypsy magic 
and sorcery here described is purely Shamanic — that is to say, of the most 
primitive Tartar type — and it is the more interesting as having preserved 
from prehistoric times many of the most marked characteristics of the 
-world's first magic or religion. It treats every disease, disorder, trouble, 
• or affliction as the work of an evil spirit; it attempts to banish these 
influences by the aid of ceremonies, many of which, by the disgusting and 
singular nature of the ingredients employed, show the lingering influences 
of the black witchcraft which preceded Shamanism ; and it invokes favourable 
supernatural agencies, such as the spirits of the air and Mashmurdalo', the 
giant of the forests. In addition to this there will be found to be clearly 
and unmistakably associated with all their usages, symbols and things nearly 
connected with much which is to be found in Greek, Roman, and Indian 
mythology or symbolism. Now whether this was drawn from " classic " 
.sources, or whether all came from some ancient and obscure origin, cannot 
now be accurately determined. But it certainly cannot be denied that 
Folk-lore of this kind casts a great deal of light on the early history of 
mankind, and the gradual unfolding or evolution of religion and of mind, 
and that, if intelligently studied, this of the gypsies is as important as 
.any chapter in the grand work. 

The gypsies came, historically speaking, very recently from India. 



THE ORIGIN OF WITCHCRAFT, SHAMANISM, AND SORCERY. 9 

It has not been so carefully observed as it might that all Indians are not 
of the religion of Brahma, much less of Buddha or of Mahommed, and 
that among the lower castes, the primaeval Altaic Shamanism, with even 
earlier witchcraft, still holds its own. Witchcraft, or Voodoo, or Obi, 
relies greatly on poisoning for its magic, and the first gypsies were said 
to poison unscrupulously. Even to this day there is but one word 
with them as with many Hindoos for both medicine and poison — id est 
drab. How exactly this form of witchcraft and Shamanism exists to- 
day in India appears from the following extract from The St. James s 
Gazette, September 8, 1888 : — 

THE HINDOO PRIEST. 

In India, the jadoo-wallah, or exorcist, thrives apace ; and no wonder, for is not the 
lower-caste Hindoo community bhut, or demon-ridden ? Every village, graveyard, burning- 
ghat, has its special bhut or bhuts ; and the jadoo-wallah is the earthly mediator between 
their bhutships and the common folk. The exorcist is usually the spiritual adviser to 
the population of a low-caste village, and is known as a gooroo, or priest : that is to 
say, he professes to hold commune with the spirits of defunct Hindoos which have 
qualified for their unique position in the other world — by their iniquity in this one, per- 
haps. Every Hindoo has a guardian bhut that requires propitiating, and the gooroo is 
the medium. 

Amongst the Jaiswars and other low-caste Hindoos, caste is regulated by carnal pice, 
and a man is distinguished amongst them by a regulated monetary scale. One person 
may be a 14-anna caste man while another may only be a 12-anna caste man. Does 
the 12-anna caste man wish to supersede the 14-anna caste man, then he consults 
the gooroo, who will, in consideration of a certain contribution, promote him to a 
higher-caste grade. A moneyed man having qualms about his future state should join 
the Jaiswars, where at least he would have an opportunity of utilizing his spare cash 
for the good of his soul. The average gooroo will be only too glad to procure him 
•everlasting glory for a matter of a few rupees. 

The gooroo, then, serves as regulator of the lower-caste Hindoo system. But it is 
our intention to exhibit him in his peculiar position of exorcist-general to the people. 
This will perhaps be best explained by an account of the case of one Kaloo. Kaloo 
was a grass-cutter, and had been offended by Kasi, a brother grass-cutter. Kasi, it 
appears, had stolen Kaloo's quilt one night during his temporary absence at a neighbouring 
liquor-shop. Kaloo, on his return, finding his quilt gone, raised jhe hue-and-cry ; and 
Mooloo, the village policeman, traced the robbery to Kasi's hut. Yet, in spite of this 
damning proof, the village pa?ic/?ayet, or bench of magistrates, decided that, as Kaloo 

3 



io GYPSY SORCERY. 

could not swear to the exact colour of his lost quilt — Kaloo was colour-blind — it could 
not possibly be his. Anyhow, Kaloo kept Kasi in view and hit upon a plan to do him. 
a grievous bodily injury. Scraping together a few rupees, he went to the village gooroo 
and promised that worthy a reward if he would only exorcise the bhuts and get them 
to " make Kasi's liver bad." The gooroo, in consideration of five rupees cash, promised 
compliance. So that night we find the gooroo busy with sandal-wood and pig's blood 
propitiating the neighbouring bhuts. Needless to say that Kasi had in a very short space 
of time all the symptoms of liver complaint. Whether the bhuts gave Kasi a bad liver 
or the gooroo gave him a few doses of poison is a question. Anyhow, Kasi soon died. 
Another case in point is that of Akuti. Akuti was a retired courtesan who had long 
plied a profitable trade in the city. We find her, however, at her native village of 
Ramghur, the wife of one Balu. Balu soon got tired of his Akuti, and longed for the 
contents of her strong box wherein she kept her rupees, bracelets, nose-rings, and other 
valuables. This was a rather awkward matter for Balu, for Akuti was still in the prime 
of life. Balu accordingly vists the gooroo and wants Akuti's liver made bad. "Nothing 
easier," says the gooroo : " five rupees." Balu has reckoned without his host, however : 
for the gooroo, as general spiritual adviser to the Ramghur community, visits Akuti and 
tells her of Balu's little scheme. Naturally Balu's liver is soon in a decline, for Akuti's 
ten rupees were put in the opposite side of the gooroo's scales. 

Knaves of the gooroo genus flourish in India, and when their disposition is vicious 
the damage they can do is appalling. That these priests exist and do such things as 
I have illustrated is beyond question. Ask any native of India his views on the bhut 
question, and he will tell you that there are such things, and, further, that the gooroo is the 
only one able to lay them, so to speak. According to the low-caste Hindoo, the bhut is a 
spiteful creature which requires constant supplies of liquor and pork; otherwise it will 
wreak its vengeance on the forgetful votary who neglects the supply. A strange idea, 
too, is this of pork being pleasing to the bhuts ; but when it is remembered that the 
Jaiswars, Chamars, and other low-caste Hindoos are inordinately fond of that meat 
themselves, they are right in supposing pig to be the favourite dish of the bhuts, who, 
after all, are but the departed spirits of their own people. Naturally bhai (brother) 
Kaloo, or bahin (sister, English gypsy pen) Akuti, the quondam grass-cutter and courtesan 
of Ramghur village, who in this life liked nothing better than a piece of bacon and a 
dram of spirits, will, in their state of bhuthood hanker after those things still. Acting 
on these notions of the people, the gooroo lives and thrives exceedingly. 

Yet of all this there is nothing " Hindoo," nothing of the Vedas. 
It is all pre-Aryan, devil-worshipping, poisoning, and Turanian ; and it 
is exactly like voodooing in Philadelphia or any other city in America. 
It is the old faith which came before all, which existed through and 
under Brahminism, Buddhism, and Mahommedanism, and which, as is well 



THE ORIGIN OF WITCHCRAFT, SHAMANISM, AND SORCERY, n 

known, has cropped out again and flourishes vigorously under British 
toleration. And this is the faith which forms the basis of European 
gypsy sorcery, as it did of yore that of the Chaldaean and Etrurian, 
which still survive in the witchcraft of the Tuscan Romagna. Every 
gypsy who came to Europe a few centuries ago set up as a gooroo, 
and did his sorceries after the same antique fashion. Even to-day it is 
much the same, but with far less crime. But the bhut or malignant 
spirit is, under other names, still believed" in, still doctored by gypsies 
with herbs and smoke, and " be -rhymed like an Irish rat," and conjured 
into holes bored in trees, and wafted away into running streams, 
and naively implored to " go where he is wanted," to where he was 
nursed, and to no longer bother honest folk who are tired of him. 
And for all this the confiding villager must pay the gypsy wise-woman 
" so much monies" — as it was in the beginning and is now in good 
faith among millions in Europe who are in a much better class of 
society. And from this point of view I venture to say that there is 
not a charm or spell set down in this work or extant which will not be 
deeply interesting to every sincere student of the history of culture. Let 
me, however, say in this beginning once for all that I have only given 
specimens sufficient to illustrate my views, for my prescribed limits quite 
forbid the introduction of all the gypsy cures, spells, &c, which I have 
collected. 




CHAPTER II. 

CHARMS AND CONJURATIONS TO CURE THE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 
HUNGARIAN GYPSY MAGIC. 




the sick man or woman says: — 



jf- HOUGH not liable to many 
^ disorders, the gypsies in 
b- Eastern Europe, from their 
g- wandering, out-of-doors. 
'- life, and camping by- 
marshes and pools where 
there is malaria, suffer a great 
deal from fevers, which in their 
simple system of medicine are 
divided into the shilale — i.e.,. 
chills or cold — and the tate 
shilalyi, "hot-cold," or fever and 
ague. For the former, the 
following remedy is applied : 
Three lungs and three livers. 
of frogs are dried and powdered 
and drunk in spirits, after which. 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 13 

" Cuckerdya pal m're per 
Caven save misece ! 
Cuckerdya pal m're per 
Den miseceske drom odry prejial ! " 

"Frogs in my belly 
Devour what is bad ! 
Frogs in my belly 
Show the evil the way out ! " 

By " the evil " is understood evil spirits. According to the old 
Shamanic belief, which was the primaeval religion of all mankind, every 
disease is caused by an evil spirit which enters the body and can only 
be driven out by magic. We have abundant traces of this left in our 
highest civilization and religion among people who gravely attribute every 
evil to the devil instead of the unavoidable antagonisms of nature. 
Nothing is more apparent in the New Testament than that all diseases 
were anciently regarded as coming from devils, or evil occult, spiritual 
influences, their negative or cure being holiness in some form. This the 
Jews, if they did not learn it from the Assyrians in the first place, had 
certainly studied deeply in Babylon, where it formed the great national 
cult. " It was the devil put it into my head," says the criminal ; and 
there is not a point of this old sorcery which is not earnestly and 
seriously advocated by the Roman Catholic Church and the preachers 
of the Salvation Army. Among the American Red Indians the idea 
of evil spirits is carried to logical extremes. If a pen drops from our 
fingers, or a penny rolls from our grasp, the former of course falls on 
our new white dress, while the latter nine times out of ten goes 
directly to the nearest grating, or crack or rat-hole. I aver that it 
is literally true, if I ever search for a letter or paper it is 
almost always at the bottom of the rest, while ink-wipers and pens 
seem to be endowed with more than mere instinct or reason — they 
manifest genius in concealing themselves. The Indians having observed 
this have come to the conclusion that it is all the work of certain 



I4 GYPSY SORCERY. 

busy little mischievous goblins, in which I, to a certain extent, agree with 
them, holding, however, that the dwelling-place of these devilkins, is in 
our own brain. What are our dreams but the action of our other 
mind, or a second Me in my brain ? Certainly it is with no will 
or effort, or act of mine, that I go through a diabolical torturing 
nightmare, or a dreadful dream, whose elaborate and subtle construction 
betrays very often more ingenuity than I in my waking hours possess. 
I have had philosophical and literary dreams, the outlines of which I 
have often remembered waking, which far transcended anything of the 
kind which I could ever hope to write. The maker of all this is not 
/ or my will, and he is never about, or on hand, when I am self- 
conscious. But in the inadvertent moments of oblivion, while writing, 
or while performing any act, this other I, or I's, (for there may be a 
multitude of them for aught I know) step in and tease — even as they 
do in dreams. Now the distinction between this of subjective demons 
acting objectively, and objective or outside spirits, is really too fine 
to be seen even by a Darwinian-Carpenterian-Haeckelite, and therefore 
one need not be amazed that Piel Sabadis or Tomaquah, of the Passa- 
maquoddy tribe, or Obeah Gumbo of New Orleans, should, with these 
experiences, jump at ghosts and "gobblers," is not to be wondered at; 
still less that they should do something to conciliate or compel these haunt- 
ing terrors, or " buggs," as they were once called — whence bogeys. It 
is a fact that if one's ink-wipers get into the habit of hiding all we 
have to do is to deliberately destroy them and get others, or at least watch 
them carefully, and they will soon be cured of wandering. On the other 
hand, sacrifices to conciliate and please naturally occur, and the more 
expensive these are the better are they supposed to be. And as human 
beings were of old the most valuable property, they were as naturally 
supposed to be most acceptable to the gods, or, by the monotheists, to 
God. A West Indian voodoo on being reproached for human sacrifices 
to the serpent, and for eating the bodies slain, replied, " Do you 
believe that the Son of God was sacrificed to save man, and do you not 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 15 

eat what your priests say is His very body ? " So difficult is it to draw 
distinctions between that which is spiritual and the mockeries which 
appear to be such ! 

The scape-goat, or sufferer, who is martyred that many may escape 
— or in other words, the unfortunate minority — is a natural result of 
sacrifice. There is a curious trace of it in Hungarian Gypsy Shamanism. 
On Easter Monday they make a wooden box or receptacle which is 
called t\vz:\bicdften, pronounced like the English gypsy word bitchapen 
and meaning the same, that is — a sending, a thing sent or gift. In this, 
at the bottom, are two sticks across, " as in a cradle," and on these 
are laid herbs and other fetish stuff which every one touches with the 
finger ; then the whole is enveloped in a winding of white and red 
wool, and carried by the oldest person of the tribe from tent to tent ; 
after which it is borne to the next running stream and left there, after 
every one has spat upon it. By doing this they think that all the 
diseases and disorders which would have befallen them during the 
coming year 'are conjured into the box. But woe to him who shall 
find the \ box and open it, instead of throwing it at once into the stream ! 
All the diseases exorcised by the gypsy band will fall upon him and 
his in full measure. 

It would be an interesting question to know how many good people 
there are, let us say in London, who, if they had an opportunity to work 
off all their colds, gouts, scarlet-fevers, tooth- head- and stomach-aches, 
with the consequent doctors' bills, or all suffering and expenses, on some 
other family ^by means of secret sorcery, would or would not " try it 
on " ? It is curious to observe the resemblance of the gypsy ceremony, 
with its box full of mischief, and the Jewish goat ; not forgetting the 
red wool handed down from heathen sacrifice and sorcery of old. In the 
Bible white wool is the symbol of purification (Isaiah i. 18). The 
feet of the statues of the gods were enveloped in wool — Dii laneos habent 
pedes — to signify that they are slow to avenge, if sure. It is altogether 
an interesting object, this gypsy casket, and one would like to know 



l6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

what all the channels were through which the magic ran ere it came 
to them. 

Another cure against the fever is to go to a running stream and 
cast pieces of wood nine times backwards into the running water, 
repeating the rhymes : — 

" Shilalyi prejia, 
Pafiori me tut 'dav ! 
Nani me tut kamav ; 
Andakode prejia, 
Odoy tut cuciden, 
Odoy tut ferinen, 
Odoy tut may kamen ! 
Mashurdalo sastyar ! " 

" Fever go away from me, 
I give it, water, unto thee ! 
Unto me thou art not dear, 
Therefore go away from here 
To where they nursed thee, 
Where they shelter thee, 
Where they love thee, 
Mashurdalo — help ! " 

This is a very remarkable invocation which takes us into true 
heathenism. Mashurdalo, or, correctly speaking, Mashmurdalo (it would 
be Masmerdo in English gypsy), means meat-killer. He is a sylvan 
giant — he has his hold by wode and wolde as outlawes wont to do, in far- 
away forests and lonely rocky places, where he lurks to catch beast and 
men in order to devour them. It is needless to say to those who are 
aware that the taste of white people's flesh is like that of very superior 
chicken, and a negro's something much better than grouse, that Mash- 
murdalo prefers, like a simple, unsophisticated savage as he is, men to 
animals. Like the German peasant who remarked,*:. " It's all meat, any- 
how," when he found a mouse in his soup, Mashmurdalo is not particular. 
He is the guardian of great treasures ; like most men in the " advance 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 17 

business " he knows where the cc money " is to be found — unlike them he 
is remarkably stupid, and can be easily cheated of his valuables. But if 
anybody does this Morgante a service he is very grateful, and aids his 
benefactor either with a loan or with his enormous strength. In many 
respects he bears a remarkable resemblance to two giants in the American 
Algonkin mythology, especially to At-was-kenni ges — the Spirit of the 
Forest — who is equally powerful, good-natured, and stupid, and to the 
Chenoo, who is a cannibal giant and yet grateful to friends, and also to 
several Hindoo gods. The gypsies have here evidently fused several Oriental 
beings into one. This is a process which occurs in the decline of myth- 
ologies as in languages. In the infancy of a speech, as in its old age, 
many words expressing different ideas, but which sound somewhat alike, 
become a single term. In English gypsy I have found as many as eight 
or ten Hindi words thus concentrated into one. 

Another cure for a fever. The sufferer goes in the forest and finds 
a young tree. When the first rays of the rising sun fall on it the patient 
shakes it with all his might and exclaims : — 

" Shilalyi, shilalyi prejia 
Kathe tu besha, kathe tu besha ! " 

" Fever, fever, go away ! 
Here shalt thou stay. Here shalt thou stay ! " 

It is here plain that the shaking the sapling is intended to transfer 
the shakes, as the chill and shuddering of the fever is called in America, 
to the tree. 

" Then the fever passes into the tree." Perhaps it was in this way 
that the aspen learned to tremble. But among the gypsies in the south 
of Hungary, among whom the vaccination or inoculation of trees is greatly 
the fashion, a hole is bored into the wood, into which the patient spits 
thrice, repeats the spell, and then stops the hole with a plug. The 
boring of holes in trees or transferring illness to them is also practised 
without formulas of speech. Thus, if while a man is lying down or sitting 

4 



1 8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

in the spring he hears the song of the cuckoo he believes that he will be- 
ill all the time for a year to come, especially with fevers, unless he goes 
nine times to a tree, bores a hole in it, and spits into it three times. Then 
he is safe. In German mythology " the cuckoo is a bird which brings bad 
luck " (Friedrich), and the inhabitants of Haiterbach were so persuaded of 
this that they introduced a prayer against it into their church service, whence 
they got the name of cuckoos (Wolf, " Zeitschrift fur Deutsche Myth," 
vol. i. p. 440). It announces to men the infidelity of wives, and tells 
listeners how many years they have to live. 

It is possible that this is a relic of an old form of sacrifice, or proof 
that the idea occurs to all men of thus making a casket of a tree. The 
occasional discovery of stone axe-heads in very old trees in America 
renders this probable. And where the wood grows up and encloses the 
object it would very rarely happen that it would ever be discovered. It 
should be added to the previous instance that when they have closed the 
hole, the Transylvanian gypsies eat some of the bark of the next tree. 

Another cure for fever is effected by going in the morning before 
sunrise to the bank of a stream, and digging a hole with some object — for 
instance, a knife — which has never been used. Into this hole the patient 
makes water, then fills up the hole, saying : — 

" Shilalyi ac kathe 
Na ava kiya mange ! 
Sutyara andre cik ! 
Ava kiya mange 
Kana kathe na hin pani ! " 

" Fever stay here ! 
Do not come to me ! 
Dry up in dust, 
Come unto me 
When no water is here." 

Dr. Wlislocki translates this last line, "When there is no more 
water in the river," which is certainlv what is meant. "While water 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 19 

runs or grass grows," &c. is a formula common to all countries. Another 
cure for fever is this : the patient must take a kreutzer, an egg, and 
a handful of salt, and before sunrise go with them to a cross-road, throw 
them away backwards, and repeat : — 

" Kana adala kiya mange aven 
Ava tu kiya mange shilalyi." 

" When these things again I see, 
Fever then return to me." 

Or literally, " When these things to me come." For the next three 
'days the invalid must not touch money, eggs, or salt. There is an old 
MS. collection of English charms and ceremonies, professedly of " black 
witchcraft," in which we are told that if a girl will walk stark-naked by 
the light of the full moon round a field or a house, and cast behind her 
at every step a handful of salt, she will get the lover whom she desires. 
Salt, says Moresinus, was sacred to the infernal deities, and it was 
a symbol of the soul, or of life, because it preserved the body while in it 
(Pitiscus, "Leg. Ant. Rom." ii. p. 675). The devil never eats salt. Once 
there was in Germany a peasant who had a witch for a wife, and the devil 
invited them to supper. But all the dishes were without any seasoning, 
and the peasant, despite all nudges and hints to hold his tongue kept 
crying for salt. And when it was brought and he said, "Thank God, 
here is salt at last ! " the whole Spuck, or ghastly scene, vanished (Horst, 
" Dasmonomagie," Frankfurt, 18 18, vol. ii. p. 213). For a great deal of 
further information and symbolism on and of salt, including all the views 
of the ancient Rabbis and modern rationalists on the subject of Lot's wife, 
the reader may consult " Symbolik und Mythologie der Natur," by J. 
B. Friedrich, Wurzburg, 1859 : "Salt is put into love-philtres and charms 
to ensure the duration of an attachment; in some Eastern countries it is 
carried in a little bag as an amulet to preserve health." 

Another cure for fever. The patient must drink, from a new jug, 
-water from three brooks, and after every drink throw into the running 



20 GYPSY SORCERY. 

stream a handful of salt. Then he must make water into the first and: 

say : — 

" Kathe hin t'ro sherro ! " 

" Here is thy head ! " 

At the second he repeats the sacred ceremony and murmurs : — 

" Kathe hin t'ro pera ! " 
" Here is thy belly ! " 

And again at the third he exclaims : — 

"Te kathehin t're punra. 
Ja atunci andre pafii ! " 

"And here are thy feet. 
Go now into the water ! " 

But while passing from one stream to another he must not look back, 
once, for then he might behold the dread demon of the fever which 
follows him, neither must he open his mouth, except while uttering the 
charm, for then the fever would at once enter his body again through 
the portal thus left unclosed. This walking on in apprehension of beholding 
the ugly spectre will recall to the reader a passage in the " Ancient 
Mariner," of the man who walks in fear and dread, 

" Nor turns around his head, 
For well he knows a frightful fiend 
Doth close behind him tread." 

The wise wives among the gypsies in Hungary have many kinds- 
of miraculous salves for sale to cure different disorders. These they 
declare are made from the fat of dogs, bears, wolves, frogs, and the 
like. As in all fetish remedies they are said to be of strange or 
revolting materials, like those used by Canidia of yore, the witches of" 
Shakespeare and Ben Jonson, and of Burns in Tarn O'Shanter. 

When a man has been "struck by a spirit" there results a sore- 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 21 

swelling or boil, which is cured by a sorceress as follows : The patient 
is put into a tent by himself, and is given divers drinks by his 
attendant ; then she rubs the sufferer with a salve, the secret of which 
is known only to her, while she chants : — 

"Prejia, prejia, prejia, 
Kiya miseceske, ac odoy ; 
Trianda sapa the caven tut, 
Trianda jiukla tut cingeren, 
Trianda kacna tut cunaven ! " 

"Begone, begone, begone 
To the Evil One ; stay there. 
May thirty snakes devour thee, 
Thirty dogs tear thee, 
Thirty cocks swallow thee ! " 

After this she slaughters a black hen, splits it open, and lays it 
on the boil. Then the sufferer must drink water from three springs or 
rivulets, and throw wood nine times into the fire daily until he is welL 
But black hens cost money, according to Wlislocki ; albeit the gypsies, 
like the children of the Mist in " Waverley," are believed to be acquainted 
with a far more economical and direct method of obtaining such com- 
modities. Therefore this expensive and high-class cure is not often 
resorted to, and when it is the sorceress generally substitutes something 
cheaper than poultry. It may be here observed that the black hen occurs, 
frequently in mediaeval witch-lore and legend as a demon-symbol (Wolf, 
" Niederlandische Sagen," pp. 647, 650). Thus the bones of sorcerors turn 
into black hens and chickens, and it is well if your black hen dies, for if she 
had not you would have perished in her place. Black hens were walled up in 
castles as sacrifices to the devil, that the walls might long endure ; hence the 
same fowl occurs in the arms of the family of Henneberg (Nork, " Myth- 
ologie der Volksagen," p. 381). The lore on this subject is very extensive. 

The following remedy against headache is in general use among 
Transylvanian gypsies. The patient's head is rubbed, and then washed,, 
with vinegar or hot water while the following charm is repeated : — 



GYPSY SORCERY. 

Oh duk andro m'ro shero 

The o dad misecescro, 

Ada dikhel akana, 

Man tu may dosta, mardyas, 

Miro shero tu mardyas ! 

Tu na ac tu andre me. 

Ja tu, ja tu, ja kere. 

Kay tu misec cucides, 

Odoy, odoy sikoves ! 

Ko jal pro m'ro ushalyin, 

Adaleske e duk hin ! " 

Oh, pain in my head, 

The father of all evil, 

Look upon thee now ! 

Thou hast greatly pained me, 

Thou tormentest my head, 

Remain not in me ! 

Go thou, go thou, go home, 

Whence thou, Evil One, didst suck, 

Thither, thither hasten ! 

Who treads upon my shadow, 

To him be the pain ! " 



It will be seen that the principle of treading on the tail of the 
coat practised in Ireland is much outdone by the gypsies who give a 
headache to any one who so much as treads on their shadows. And it 
is not difficult to understand that, as with children, the rubbing the 
head, the bathing it with warm water or vinegar, and, finally, the singing 
a soothing song, may all conduce to a cure. The readers of " Helen's 
Babies " will remember the cures habitually wrought on Budge by 
singing to him, " Charley boy one day." Gypsies are in many respects 
mere children, or little Budges. There can be no doubt that where 
faith is very strong, and imagination is lively, cures which seem to 
border on the miraculous are often effected — and this is, indeed, the basis 
of all miracle as applied to relieving bodily afflictions. All of this may 
-be, if not as yet fully explained by physiology, at least shown to probably 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 23 

rest on a material basis. But no sound system of cure can be founded 
on it, because there is never any certainty, especially for difficult and 
serious disorders, that they can ever be healed twice in succession. 
The " faith " exacted is sometimes a purely hereditary gift, at other 
times merely a form of blind ignorance and credulity. It may vividly 
influence all the body, and it may fail to act altogether. But the 
" Faith Healer " and " Christian Scientist," or " Metaphysical Doctor," 
push boldly on, and when they here and there heal a patient once, it is 
published to the four winds as a proof of invariable infallibility. And 
as everybody believes that he has " faith," so he hopes to be cured. In 
popular custom for a man to say he believes in anything, and to be 
sure that he really has nothing against it, constitutes as much " faith " 
as most men understand. A man may be utterly destitute of any moral 
principle and yet live in a constant state of " faith " and pious con- 
viction. Here the capacity for cure by means of charms is complete. 

In connection with these charms for the head we may find not 
less interesting those in reference to the hair, as given by the same 
authority, Dr. von Wlislocki. The greatest pains are taken to ensure 
even for the new-born child what is called a full head, because every 
one who dies bald is turned into a fish, and must remain in this form 
till he has collected as many hairs as would make an ordinary wig. But 
this lasts a long time, since he can find but a single hair every month 
or moon. The moon is in many ways connected in gypsy faith with 
the hair. He who sleeps bare-headed in its light will lose his hair, or 
else it will become white. To have a heavy growth a man must scoop 
up with his left hand water from a. running brook, against the current, 
and pour it on his head. 

Immediately after the first bathing of a newly-born child, and its 
anointing, its forehead and neck are marked with a semicircle — perhaps 
meant to indicate the moon — made with a salve called barcali, intended 
to promote the growth of the hair. A brew, or mess, is made from 
beans and the blood of a cow. Hairs are taken from the heads of the 



24 GYPSY SORCERY. 

father and mother, which hairs are burnt to a powder and mixed with 
the brew. It is remarkable that the beans are only used for a boy, 
their object being to insure for him great virile or sexual power. "The 
bean," says Friedrich ("Sym. d. N."), "is an erotic symbol, or one 
signifying sexual pleasure." Hence it was forbidden to the Egyptian 
priests, the Pythagoreans, the priests of Jupiter in Rome, and to the 
Jewish high priests on certain festivals. But if the child is a girl, 
the seeds of the pumpkin or sunflower are substituted for beans, because 
the latter would make her barren. 

It is an old belief, and one widely spread, that if the witches or 
the devil can get a lock of anybody's hair, they can work him evil. 
The gypsies have the following articles of faith as regards hairs : — 

Should birds find any, and build them into their nests, the man 
who lost them will suffer from headaches until, during the wane of 
the moon, he rubs his head with the yolk of eggs and washes it clean 
in running water. It would be very curious if this method of cleaning 
the hair and giving it a soft gloss, so much in vogue among English 
ladies, should have originated in sorcery. Beyond this, the sufferer must 
mix some of his hairs with food and give them to a white dog to eat. 

If hairs which have fallen or been cut away are found by a snake 
and carried into its hole, the man from whom they came will continue 
to lose more until those in the snake's nest are quite decayed. 

If you see human hairs in the road do not tread on them, since, 
in that case, if they came from a lunatic, you, too, will go mad. 
According to Marcellus Burdigalensis, if you pick up some hairs 
in the road just before entering a city gate, tie one to your own head, and, 
throwing the rest away, walk on without looking behind you, you can 
cure a headache. I have found nearly the same charm for the same 
purpose in Florence, but accompanied by the incantation which is wanting 
in Marcellus. Also his cure for headache with ivy from the head of 
a statue, which is still used in Tuscany with the incantation which the 
Roman omits. 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 25 

Finding a hair hanging to your coat, carefully burn it, since you 
may by so doing escape injury by witchcraft. And we may remark in 
confirmation of this, that when you see a long hair on a man's coat it is 
an almost certain sign that he has been among the witches, or is bewitched ; 
as the Countess thought when she found one clinging to the button 
of her lover, Von Adelstein, as set forth in " Meister Karl's Sketch-book." 

But to bewitch your enemy get some of his combed-out hair, 
steep it in your own water, and then throw it on his garments. Then 
he will have no rest by night or day. I have observed that in all 
the Tuscan charms intended to torment a foe, the objects employed 
are like this of a disgusting nature. 

If a wife will hold her husband to her in love, she must take of her 
own hair and bind it to his. This must be done three times by full moon- 
light. 

Or if a maid will win the love of a young man, she must take of her 
own hair, mix it with earth from his footsteps — IC und mischt diese mit dem 
Speichel einer laufigen Hundinn auf " — burn the whole to powder, and so 
manage that the victim shall eat it — which, it is needless to say, it is not 
likely that he will do, knowing what it is. Earth from the footsteps of 
any one is regarded as a very powerful means of bewitching him in Italian 
and ancient sorcery. 

If a man bind the combings of his hair to the mane of a strange 
horse it will be wild and shy till the hairs are removed. 

For easy childbirth red hair is sewed in a small bag and carried 
on the belly next the skin during pregnancy. Red hair indicates good 
luck, and is called bald kdmeskro, or sun-hairs, which indicates its Indian 
origin. 

If any one dreams much of the dead, let him sew some of his hair 
into an old shoe, and give it to any beggar. Thereby he will prevent evil 
spirits from annoying him. 

If a child suffers from sleeplessness, some of its mother's hair should be 
sewed into its wrappings, and others pulverized, mixed with a decoction 

S 



26 GYPSY SORCERY. 

of elderberries, be given it to drink. In German Folk-lore, as I shall 
show more fully anon, the elder often occurs as a plant specially identified 
with sorcery. In gypsy it is called yakori bengeskro, or the devil's eye, 
from its berries. 

Nails cut on Friday should be burned, and the ashes mingled with the 
fodder of cattle, who are thus ensured against being stolen or attacked by 
wild beasts. If children are dwarfish, the same ashes in their food will 
make them grow. If a child suffers from pains in the stomach, a bit of 
nail must be clipped from its every finger ; this is mixed with the dried 
dung of a foal, and the patient exposed to the smoke while it is burned. 

A child's first tooth must, when it falls out, be thrown into a hollow 
tree. Those which come out in the seventh year are carefully kept, and 
whenever the child suffers from toothache, one is thrown into a stream. 

Teeth which have been buried for many years, serve to make a singular 
fetish. They are mingled with the bones of a tree-frog, and the whole 
then sewed up in a little bag. If a man has anything for sale, and will 
draw or rub this bag over it, he will have many offers or customers for 
the articles thus enchanted. The bones are prepared by putting the frog 
into a glass or earthen receptacle full of small holes. This is buried in 
an ant-hill. The ants enter the holes and eat away all the flesh, leaving 
the bones which after a few weeks are removed. 1 

To bear healthy and strong children women wear a string of bears' 
claws and children's teeth. Dr. von Wljslocki cites, apropos of this, 
a passage from Jacobus Rueff, "Von Empfengnussen " : " Etlich schwanger 
wyber pflagend einen baren klauen von einem baren tapen yngefaszet 
am hals zuo tragen " (Some women when with child are accustomed to 

1 " It is said that if the bones of a green frog which has been eaten by ants are 
taken, those on the left side will provoke hatred, and those on the right side excite 
love" ("Div. Cur.," c. 23). . . . "One species of frog called rubeta, because it lives 
among brambles, is said to have wonderful powers. Brought into an assembly of people 
it imposes silence. If the little bone in its right side be thrown into boiling water it 
chills it at once. It excites love when put into a draught" ("Castle Saint Angelo and 
the Evil Eye," by W. W. Story). 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 27 

wear mounted bears' claws on their necks). In like manner boars' teeth, 
which much resemble them, are still very commonly worn in Austria and 
Italy and almost over all Europe and the East. It is but a few days 
since I here, in Florence, met with a young English lady who had bought 
a very large one mounted in silver as a brooch, but who was utterly unaware 
that there was any meaning attached to it. 1 I have a very ancient bear's 
tooth and whistle in silver, meant for a teething child. It came from Munich. 
Pain in the eyes is cured with a wash made of spring or well water 
and saffron. During the application the following is recited : — 

" Oh dukh andral yakha 
Ja andre pani 
Ja andral pani 
Andre safrane 
Andre pcuv. 
Ja andral pcuv 
Kiya Pcuvusheske. — 
Odoy hin cerca, 
Odoy ja te 9a." 

" Oh, pain from the eyes 
Go into the water, 
Go out of the water 
Into the saffron, 
Go out of the saffron 
Into the earth. 
To the Earth-Spirit. 
There's thy home. 
There go and eat." 

This incantation casts light upon the earliest Shamanic remedies. 
When it was discovered that certain herbs really possessed curative 
qualities, this was attributed to inherent magic virtues. The increase of 
their power by combining them with water, or mingling them, was due to 

1 According to Pliny, the tooth of a wolf hung to the neck of an infant was believed 
to be an efficient amulet against disease ; and a child's tooth caught before it falls to 
the ground and set in a bracelet was considered to be beneficial to women. Nat. Hist. 
Jib. xxvi., cap. 10 ("Castle Saint Angelo and the Evil Eye,'' by W, W. Story) 



2 8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

mystic affinities by which a spirit passed from one to another. The Spirit 
of Earth went into saffron, that of saffron into water. The magician thus 
by a song sent the pain into its medical affinity, and so on back to the 
source whence it came. From early times saffron, as one of the earliest 
flowers of spring, owing to its colour, was consecrated to magic and love. 
Eos, the goddess of the Aurora, was called KpoKOTieir\o<; y the one with the 
saffron garment. Therefore the public women wore a yellow robe. Even 
in Christian symbolism it meant love, as Portalis declares : " In the 
Christian religion the colours saffron and orange were the symbols of 
God embracing the heart and illuminating the souls of the faithful " 
(" Des Couleurs Symboliques," Paris, 1837, p. 240). So we can trace 
the chain from the prehistoric barbarous Shamanism, preserved by the 
gypsies, to the Greek, and from the Greek to the mediaeval form still 
existent. 

The same sympathetic process of transmission may be traced in the 
remedy for the erysipelas. The blood of a bullfinch is put into a new vessel 
with scraped elder-bark, and then laid on a cloth with which the eyes are 
bound up overnight. Meanwhile the patient repeats : — 

" Duy yakha hin mange 
Duy punra hin mange 
Dukh andral yakha 
Ja andre punra 
Ja. andral punra. 
Ja andre pcuv, 
Ja. andral pcuv 
Andro meriben ! " 

" I have two eyes, 
I have two feet, 
Pain from my eyes 
Go into my feet ! 
Go from my feet, 
Go into the earth ! 
Go from the earth 
Into death ! " 



We have 



here in the elder-bark associations of magic which are 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 29 

ancient and widely spread, and which still exist ; for at the present day- 
country people in New England attribute to it curative virtues which it 
really does not possess. From the earliest times among the Northern races 
the Lady Elder, as we may learn from the Edda, or Fin Magnusen 
("Priscas veterum Borealium Mythologias Lexicon," pp. 21, 239), and 
Nyerup (" Worterbuch der Scandinavischen Mythologie "), had an un- 
earthly, ghostly reputation. Growing in lonely, gloomy places its form 
and the smell of its flowers seemed repulsive, so that it was associated 
with death, and some derived its name from Frau Holle, the sorceress 
and goddess of death. But Schwenki (" Mythologie der Slaven ") with 
more probability traces it from kohl, i.e., hollow, and as spirits were believed 
to dwell in all hollow trees, they were always in its joints. The ancient 
Lithuanians, he informs us, worshipped their god Puschkeit, who was 
a form of Pluto, in fear and trembling at dusk, and left their offerings under 
the elder-tree. Everybody has seen the little puppets made of a piece 
of elder-pith with half a bullet under them, so that they always stand 
upright, and jump up when thrown down. Among the Slovaks these 
seem to have had some magical application. Perhaps their priests 
persuaded them that these jumping Jacks were miraculous, for they 
called them Pikuljk, a name derived from Peklo, the under-world. 
They still believe in a Pikuljk, who is a servant of the Evil One. 
He does all kinds of favours for men, but ends by getting their souls. 
The ancestors of the Poles were accustomed to bury all their sins and 
sorrows under elder-trees, thinking that they thereby gave to the lower 
world what properly belonged to it. This corresponds accurately to the 
gypsy incantation which passes the disease on from the elder bark into the 
earth, and from earth unto death. Frau Ellhorn, or Ellen, was the old 
German name for this plant. " Frau, perhaps, as appropriate to the 
female elf who dwelt in it" (Friedrich, "Symbolik," p. 293). When it 
was necessary to cut one down, the peasant always knelt first before it 
and prayed : " Lady Ellhorn, give me of thy wood, and I will give thee 
of mine when it shall grow in the forest." Grimm ("Deutsche Mythologie," 



3° 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



cxvi.) cites from a MS. of 1727 the following: " Paga nismo ortum debet 
superstitio, sambucam non esse exscindendum nisi prius rogata permissione 
his verbis: Mater Sambuci permitte mihi tu<e ccedere sylvam ! " On the 
other hand, Elder had certain protective and healing virtues. Hung before 
a stable door it warded off witchcraft, and he who planted it conciliated 
evil spirits. And if a twig of it were planted on a grave and it grew, that 
was a sign that the soul of the deceased was happy, which is the probable 
reason why the very old Jewish cemetery in Prague was planted full of elders. 
In a very curious and rare work, entitled " Blockesberge Berichtung (Leipzig, 
1669), by John Pr^etorius, devoted to "the Witch-ride and Sorcery- 
Sabbath," the author tells us that witches make great use of nine special 
herbs — " nam in herbis, verbis et lapidibus magna vis est!' Among these 
is Elder, of which the peasants make wreaths, which, if they wear on 
Walpurgis night, they can see the sorceresses as they sweep through the air 
on their brooms, dragons, goats, and other strange steeds to the Infernal 
Dance. Or when they anderswo herumvagiren — " go vagabonding any- 
where else." " Yea, and I know one fellow who sware unto men, that by 
means of this herb he once saw certain witches churning butter busily, and 
that on a roof, but I mistrust that this was a sell (Schnake), and that the 
true name of this knave was Butyrolambius" (" Blocksberg," p. 475). The 
same author informs us that Hollunder (or Elder) is so called from hohl, 
or hollow, or else is an anagram of Unholden, unholy spirits, and some 
people call it Alhuren, from its connection with witches and debauchery, 
even as Cordus writes : — 

" When elder blossoms bloom upon the bush, 
Then women's hearts to sensual pleasure rush." 

He closes his comments on this subject with the dry remark that if 
the people of Leipzig wear, as is their wont, garlands of elder with the 
object of preventing breaches of the seventh commandment among them, 
it has in this instance, at least, utterly failed to produce the expected effect. 
" Quasi ! creadt Judaus Apella ! " 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 31 

It should be mentioned that in the gypsy spell the next morning the 
cloth with the elder-bark must be thrown into the next running water. 
To cure toothache the Transylvanian gypsies wind a barley-straw round 
a stone, which is thrown into a running stream, while saying : — 

" Oh dukh andre m're danda, 
Tu na bares cingera ! 
Na ava kiya mange, 
Mire muy na hin kere ! 
Tut nikana me kamav, 
Ac tu mange pal paca ; 
Kana e pcus yarpakri 
Avel tele panori! " 

" Oh, pain in my teeth, 
Trouble me not so greatly ! 
Do not come to me, 
My mouth is not thy house. 
I love thee not all, 
Stay thou away from me ; 
When this straw is in the brook 
Go away into the water ! " 

Straw was anciently a symbol of emptiness, unfruitfulness, and death, 
and it is evidently used in this sense by the gypsies, or derived by them 
from some tradition connected with it. A feigned or fruitless marriage 
is indicated in Germany by the terms Strohwittwer and Strohwittwe. 
From the earliest times in France the breaking a straw signified that a 
compact was broken with a man because there was nothing in him. Thus 
in 922 the barons of Charles the Simple, in dethroning him, broke the 
straws which they held (Charlotte de La Tour, "Symbols of Flowers"). 

Still, straws have something in them. She who will lay straws on 
the table in the full moonlight bv an open window, especially on Saturday 
night, and will repeat — 

" Straw, draw, crow craw, 
By my life T give thee law " — 

then the straws will become fairies and dance to the cawing of a crow 



3 2 GYPSY SORCERY. 

who will come and sit on the ledge of the window. And so witches were 
wont to make a man of straw, as did Mother Gookin, in Hawthorne's 
tale, and unto these they gave life, whence the saying of a man of straw 
and straw bail, albeit this latter is deemed by some to be related to the 
breaking of straws and of dependence, as told in the tale of Charles the 
Simple. Straw-lore is extensive and curious. As in elder-stalks, small 
fairies make their homes in its tubes. To strew chopped straw before the 
house of a bride was such an insult to her character, in Germany, and so 
common that laws were passed against it. I possess a work printed 
about 1650, entitled "De Injuriis quae haud raro Novis Nuptis inferri 
solent. I. Per sparsionem dissectorum culmorum frugum. Germ. Dusch 
das Werckerling Streuen," &c. An immense amount of learned quotation 
and reference by its author indicates that this custom which was influenced 
by superstition, was very extensively written on in its time. It was allied 
to the binding of knots and other magic ceremonies to prevent the 
consummation of marriages. 

There is a very curious principle involved in curing certain disorders 
or afflictions by means of spells or verses. A certain word is repeated 
many times in a mysterious manner, so that it strikes the imagination of 
the sufferer. There is found in the Slavonian countries a woolly caterpillar 
called WoloSy whose bite, or rather touch, is much dreaded. I have myself, 
when a boy, been stung by such a creature in the United States. As I 
remember, it was like the sting of a bee. The following (Malo Russian) 
spell against it was given me by Prof. Dragomanoff in Geneva. It is 
supposed that a certain kind of disorder, or cutaneous eruption, is caused 
by the Wolos : — 

" Wolosni — Wolosniceh ! 
Holy Wolos. 

Once a man drove over empty roads 
With empty oxen, 
To an empty field, 
To harvest empty corn, 
And gather it in empty ricks. 



•CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. n 

He gathered the empty sheaves, 

Laid them in empty wagons, 

Drove over empty roads, 

Unto an empty threshing-floor. 

The empty labourers threshed it, 

And bore it to the empty mill. 

The empty baker (woman) 

Mixed it in an empty trough, 

And baked it in an empty oven. 

The empty people ate the empty bread. 

So may the Wolos swallow this disorder 

From the empty (here the name of the patient.) 

What is here understood by " empty " is that the swelling is taken 
.away, subtracted, or emptied, by virtue of the repetition of the word, as 
if one should say, " Be thou void. Depart ! depart ! depart ! Avoid me ! " 

There is a very curious incantation also apparently of Indian-gypsy 
origin, since it refers to the spirits of the water who cause diseases. In 
this instance they are supposed to be exorcised by Saint Paphnutius, who 
is a later Slavonian-Christian addition to the old Shamanic spell. In the 
Accadian-Chaldasan formulas these spirits are seven ; here they are seventy. 

The formula in question is against the fever : — 

" In the name of God and his Son and the Holy Ghost. Amen ! 

"Seventy fair maids went up out of the ocean. 

"They met the Saint Paphnutius, who asked: 

" ' Whence come ye, oh Maidens ? ' 

"They answered, 'From the ocean-sea. 

'"We go into the world to break the bones of men. 

" ' To give them the fever. (To make hot and cold).' " 

Then the holy Paphnutius began to beat them, and gave them every 
one seventy-seven days : — 

" They began to pray, ' O holy Paphnutius ! 

'"Forgive us, (and) whoever shall bear with him (thy) name, or write it, him we will 
Jeave in peace. 

'"We will depart from him 

" ' Over the streams, over the seas. 

6 



34 GYPSY SORCERY. 

" ' Over the reeds (canes) and marshes. 

" ' O holy Paphnutius, sua misericordia, of thy mercy, 

"'Have pity on thy slave, even on the sick man (the name is here uttered), 

" ' Free him from fever ! ' " 

It is remarkable that, as a certain mysterious worm, caterpillar, or 
small lizard (accounts differ) among the Algonkin Indians is supposed to 
become at will a dragon, or sorcerer, or spirit, to be invoked or called on, 
so the Wolos worm is also invoked, sometimes as a saint or sorcerer, and 
sometimes as a spirit who scatters disease. The following gypsy-Slavonian 
incantation over an; invalid has much in common with the old Chaldaeara 
spells : — 

" Wolosni, Wolosniceh ! 

Thou holy Wolos ! 

God calls thee unto his dwelling, 

Unto his seat. 

Thou shalt not remain here, 

To break the yellow bones. 

To drink the red blood, 

To dry up the white body. 

Go forth as the bright sun 

Goes forth over the mountains, 

Out from the seventy-seven veins, 

Out from the seventy limbs (parts of the body). 

Before I shall recognize thee, 

Before I did not name thee (call on thee). 

But now I know who thou art ; 

I began to pray to the mother of God, 

And the mother of God began to aid me. 

Go as the wind goes over the meadows or the shore (or banks), 

As the waves roll over the waters, 

So may the Wolos go from 

The man who is born, 

Who is consecrated with prayer." 

The Shamanic worship of water as a spirit is extremely ancient, 
and is distinctly recognized as such by the formulas of the Church 
in which water is called "this creature." The water spirits play a 
leading part in the gypsy mythology. The following gypsy-Slav 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GRO WN PEOPLE. 35 

■charm, to consecrate a swarm of bees, was also given to me by- 
Prof. Dragomanoff, who had learned it from a peasant : — 

" One goes to the water and makes his prayer and greets the water thus : — 
" Hail to thee, Water ! 

Thou Water, Oliana ! 

Created by God, 

And thou, oh Earth, Titiana ! 

And ye the near springs, brooks and rivulets, 

Thou Water, Oliana, 

Thou goest over the earth, 

Over the neighbouring fountains and streams, 

Down unto the sea, 

Thou dost purify the sea, 

The sand, the rocks, and the roots — 

I pray thee grant me 

Of the water of this lake, 

To aid me, 

To sprinkle my bees. 

I will speak a word, 

And God will give me help, 

The all-holy Mother of God, 

The mother of Christ, 

Will aid me, 

And the holy Father 

The holy Zosimos, Sabbateus and the holy Friday Parascabeah ! 
"When this is said take the water and bear it home without looking back. Then 
the bees are to be sprinkled therewith." 

The following Malo-Russian formula from the same authority, 
though repointed and gilt with Greek Christianity, is old heathen, and 
especially interesting since Prof. Dragomanoff traces it to a Finnic 
Shaman source : — 

" Charm Against the Bite of a Serpent. 

" The holy Virgin sent a man 
Unto Mount Sion, 
Upon this mountain 
Is the city of Babylon, 
And in the city of Babylon 
Lives Queen Volga. 



36 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Oh Queen Volga, 
Why dost thou not teach 
This servant of God 
(Here the name of the one bitten by a serpent is mentioned) 
So that he may not be bitten 
By serpents ? " 

{The reply of Queen Volga ) 
"Not only will I teach my descendants 
But I also will prostrate myself 
Before the Lord God." 

" Volga is the name of a legendary heathen princess of Kief, who was baptized 
and sainted by the Russian Church. The feminine form, Olga, or Volga, corresponds 
to the masculine name Oleg, or Olg, the earliest legendary character of Kief. His 
surname was Viechtchig — the sage or sorcerer " (i.e., wizard, and from a cognate root). 
"In popular songs he is called Volga, or Volkh, which is related to Volkv, a sorcerer. 
The Russian annals speak of the Volkv of Finland, who are represented as Shamans." 
Niya Predania i Raskazi ("Traditions and Popular Tales of Lesser Russia," by M. 
Dragomanoff, Kief, 1876) in Russian. 

I have in the chapter on curing the disorders of children spoken 
of Lilith, or Herodias, who steals the new-born infants. She and her 
twelve daughters are also types of the different kinds of fever for 
which the gypsies have so many cures of the same character, precisely 
as those which were used by the old Bogomiles. The characteristic 
point is that this female spirit is everywhere regarded as the cause 
of catalepsy or fits. Hence the invocation to St. Sisinie is used in 
driving them away. This invocation written, is carried as an amulet 
or fetish. I give the translation of one of these from the Roumanian,, 
in which the Holy Virgin is taken as the healer. It is against cramp' 
in the night : — 

" Spell Against Night-cramp. 

"There is a mighty hill, and on this hill is a golden apple-tree, 
" Under the golden apple-tree is a golden stool. 
"On the stool — who sits there ? 

" There sits the Mother of God with Saint Maria ; with the boxes in her right 
hand, with the cup in her left. 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 37 

" She looks up and sees naught, she looks down and sees my Lord and Lady Disease.. 

" Lords and Ladies Cramp, Lord and Lady Vampire — Lord Wehrwolf and his wives. 

" They are going to (the sufferer), to drink his blood and put in him a foul 

heart. 

" The Mother of God, when she saw them, went down to them, spoke to them, 
and asked them, 'Whither go ye, Lord and Lady Disease,-Lords and Ladies Cramp, &c. ? '' 

" ' We go to to drink his blood, to change his heart to a foul one.' 

" ' No, ye shall return ; give him his blood back, restore him his own heart, and 
leave him immediately.' 

" Cramps of the night, cramps of the midnight, cramps of the day, cramps wherever 
they are. From water, from the wind, go out from the brain, from the light of the 
face, from the hearing of the ears, from his heart, from his hands and feet, from the 
soles of his feet. 

"Go and hide where black cocks never crow, 1 where men never go, where no 
beast roars. 

" Hide yourself there, stop there, and never show yourself more ! 

" May remain pure and glad, as he was made by God, and was fated by 

the Mother of God ! 

" The spell is mine — the cure is God's." 

In reference to the name Herodias (here identified with Lilith, the 
Hebrew mother of all devils and goblins) ; it was a great puzzle to the 
writers on witchcraft why the Italian witches always said they had two 
queens whom they worshipped — Diana and Herodias. The latter seems 
to have specially presided at the witch-dance. In this we can see an 
evident connection with the Herodias of the New Testament. 

I add to this a few more very curious old Slavonian spells from 
Dr. Gaster's work, as they admirably illustrate one of the principal and 
most interesting subjects connected with the gypsy witchcraft ; that is to 
say, its relation to early Shamanism and the forms in which its incantations 
were expressed. In all of these it may be taken for granted, from 
a great number of closely-allied examples, that the Christianity in them 
is recent and that they all go back to the earliest heathen times. The 

1 This cannot fail to remind many readers of the land — 

"Where the cock never crew, 
Where the sun never shone and the wind never blew." 



3 8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

following formula, dating from 1423, against snake-bites bears the 
title : — 

" Prayer of St. Paul against Snakes. 

"In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. I once was a 
persecutor, but am now a true follower; and I went from my dwelling-place in Sicily, 
and they set light to a trunk, and a snake came therefrom and bit my right hand and 
hung from it. But I had in me the power of God, and I shook it ofF into the 
burning fire and it was destroyed, and I suffered no ill from the bite. I laid myself 
• down to sleep ; then the mighty angel said : ' Saul, Paul, stand up and receive this 
writing ' ; and I found in it the following words : 

"'I exorcise you, sixty and a half kinds of beasts that creep on the earth, in the 
name of God, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, and in the name of the immovable 
throne. 

" ' Serpent of Evil, I exorcise thee in the name of the burning river which rises 
under the footstool of the Saviour, and in the name of His incorporeal angels ! 

" ' Thou snake of the tribe of basilisks, thou foul-headed snake, twelve-headed 
snake, variegated snake, dragon-like snake, that art on the right side of hell, whom- 
soever thou bitest thou shalt have no power to harm, and thcu must go away with 
•all the twenty-four kinds. If a man has this prayer and this curse of the true, holy 
apostle, and a snake bites him, then it will die on the spot, and the man that is 
■bitten shall remain unharmed, to the honour of the Father, the Son, and the Holy 
Ghost, now and for all time. Amen.'" 

It is not improbable that we have in Paul and the Serpent and the 
formula for curing its bite (which is a common symbol for all disease) a 
souvenir of Esculapius, the all-healer, and his serpent. The following is 
"a prayer against the toothache, to be carried about with one," i.e., as an 
amulet prayer : — 

" Spell for the Toothache. 

" Saint Peter sat on a stone and wept. Christ came to him and said, ' Peter, why 
•weepest thou?' Peter answered, 'Lord, my teeth pain me.' The Lord thereupon ordered 
the worm in Peter's tooth to come out of it and never more go in again. Scarcely had 
the worm come out when the pain ceased. Then spoke Peter, ' I pray you, O Lord, that 
when these words be written out and a man carries them he shall have no toothache.' 
-And the Lord answered, "Tis well, Peter; so may it be!'" 

It will hardly be urged that this Slavonian charm of Eastern origin 



CHARMS TO CURE DISORDERS OF GROWN PEOPLE. 39. 

could have been originated independently in England. The following, 

which is there found in the north, is, as Gaster remarks, " in the same 

wording " : — 

" Peter was sitting on a marble stone, 
And Jesus passed by. 
Peter said, ' My Lord, my God, 
How my tooth doth ache ! ' 
Jesus said, ' Peter art whole ! 
And whosoever keeps these words for My sake 
Shall never have the toothache.'" 

The next specimen is a — 

" Charm against Nose-bleeding. 

"Zachariah was slain in the Lord's temple, and his blood turned into stone. Then 

stop, O blood, for the Lord's servant, . I exorcise thee, blood, that thou stoppest 

in the name of the Saviour, and by fear of the priests when they perform the liturgy 
at the altar." 

Those who sell these charms are almost universally supposed to be 
mere quacks and humbugs. If this were the case, why do they so very 
carefully learn and preserve these incantations, transmitting them 

" as a rich legacy 
Unto their issue." 

But they really do believe in them, and will give 'great prices for 
them. Prof. Dragomanoff told me that once in Malo-Russia it became 
generally known that he had made a MS. collection of such spells. A 
peasant who was desirous of becoming a sorcerer, but who had very few 
incantations of his own, went whenever he could by stealth into the 
Professor's library and surreptitiously copied his incantations. And when 
Prof. Dragomanoff returned the next year to that neighbourhood, he found 
the peasant doing a very good business as a conjuring doctor, or faith-healer., 
I have a lady correspondent in the United States who has been initiated 
into Voodoo and studied Indian-negro witchcraft under two eminent teachers v 



4° 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



one a woman, the other a man. The latter, who was at the very head 
of the profession, sought the lady's acquaintance because he had heard 
that she possessed some very valuable spells. In the fourth or highest 
degree, as in Slavonian or Hungarian gypsy-magic, this Indian- Voodoo 
-deals exclusively with the spirits of the forest and stream. 

M. Kounavine, as set forth by Dr. A. ElysseefF {Gypsy-Lore Journal, 
July, 1890), gives a Russian gypsy incantation by which the fire is invoked 
to cure illness. It is as follows : — 

" Great Fire, my defender and protector, son of the celestial fire, equal of the sun 
who cleanses the earth of foulness, deliver this man from the evil sickness that torments 
him night and day ! " 

The fire is also invoked to punish, or as an ordeal, e.g. : — 

" Fire, who punishest the evil-doer, who hatest falsehood, who scorchest the impure, 

thou destroyest ofFenders ; thy flame devoureth the earth. Devour if he says what 

is not true, if he thinks a lie, and if he acts deceitfully." 

These are pronounced by the gypsy sorcerer facing the burning 
hearth. There is another in which fire is addressed as Jandra, and also 
invoked to punish an offender : — 

"Jandra, bearer of thunderbolts, great Periani (compare Parjana, an epithet of Indra, 
•Slavonic Perun), bearer of lightning, slay with thy thunderbolt and burn with thy 
celestial fire him who dares to violate his oath." 




CHAPTER III. 

GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS THE CURE OF CHILDREN HUN- 
GARIAN GYPSY SPELLS A CURIOUS OLD ITALIAN " SECRET " THE 

MAGIC VIRTUE OF GARLIC A FLORENTINE INCANTATION LEARNED 

FROM A WITCH LILITH, THE CHILD-STEALER, AND QUEEN OF THE 

WITCHES. 



N all the schools of Shamanlc sorcery, from those 
of the Assyrian -Accadian to the widely -spread 
varieties of the present day, the Exorcism 
forms the principal element. An exorcism 
is a formula, the properties or power of 
which is that when properly pronounced, 
especially if this be done with certain 
_ fumigations and ceremonies, it will drive 
away devils, diseases, and disasters of every 
description ; nay, according to very high, 
and that by no means too ancient, autho- 
rity, it is efficacious in banishing bugs, 
mice, or locusts, and it is equal to Persian 
powder as a fuge for fleas, but is, un- 
fortunately, too expensive to be used for 
that purpose save by the very wealthy. 
It has been vigorously applied against the 
grape disease, the Colorado beetle, the army worm, and the blizzard in 

7 




42 GYPSY SORCERY. 

the United States, but, I believe, without effect, owing possibly to differ- 
ences of climate or other antagonistic influences. 

Closely allied to the Exorcism is the Benediction, which soon grew 
out of it as a cure. The former being meant to repel and drive away 
evil, the latter very naturally suggested itself, by a law of moral polarity,, 
as a means of attracting good fortune, blessings, health, and peace. 
As the one was violently curative, the other was preventive. The 
benediction would keep the devils and all their works away from a man 
or his home — in fact, if stables be only well blessed once a year, no 
mishaps can come to any of the animals who inhabit them ; and I myself 
have known a number of donkeys to receive a benediction in Rome, the 
owner being assured that it would keep them safe from all the ills which 
donkeys inherit. And in the year 1880, in one of the principal churches of 
Philadelphia, blessed candles were sold to a congregation under guarantee 
that the purchase of one would preserve its possessor for one year against 
all disorders of the throat, on which occasion a sermon was preached, in 
the which seven instances were given in which people had thus been cured. 

Between blessing and banning it soon became evident that many 
formulas of words could be used to bring about mysterious results. It is 
probable that the Exorcism in its original was simply the angry, elevated 
tone of voice which animals as well as men instinctively employ to repel 
an enemy or express a terror. For this unusual language would be chosen, 
remembered, and repeated. With every new utterance this outcry or curse 
would be more seriously pronounced or enlarged till it became an Ernulphian 
formula. The next step would be to give it metric form, and its probable 
development is very interesting. It does not seem to have occurred to many 
investigators that in early ages all things whatever which were remembered 
and repeated were droned and intoned, or sing-sung^ until they fell of 
themselves into a kind of metre. In all schools at the present day, where 
boys are required to repeat aloud and all together the most prosaic lessons, 
they end by chanting them in rude rhythm. All monotone, be it that of 
a running brook, falls into cadence and metre. All of the sagas, or legends,. 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 43 

■of the Algonkin-Wabanaki were till within even fifty years chants or songs, 
and if they are now rapidly losing that character it is because they are no 
longer recited with the interest and accuracy which was once observed in 
the narrators. But it was simply because all things often repeated were 
thus intoned that the exorcisms became metrical. It is remarkable that 
among the Aryan races it assumed what is called the staff-rhyme, like 
that which Shakespeare, and Ben Jonson, and Byron, and many more 
employ, as it would seem, instinctively, whenever witches speak or spells 
or charms are uttered. It will not escape the reader that, in the Hungarian 
gypsy incantations in this work, the same measure is used as that which 
occurs in the Norse sagas, or in the scenes of Macbeth. It is also common 
in Italy. This is intelligible — that its short, bold, deeply-marked movement 
has in itself something mysterious and terrible. If that wofully-abused 
word " weird " has any real application to anything, it is to the staff-rhyme. 
I believe that when a man, and particularly a woman, does not know what 
else to say, he or she writes "lurid," or " weird," and I lately met with a 
book of travels in which I found the latter applied seventy-six times to all 
kinds of conundrums, until I concluded that, like the coachman's definition 

of an idea in Heine's " Reisebilder," it meant simply " any d d nonsense 

that a man gets into his head." But if weird really and only means that 
which is connected with fate or destiny, from the Anglo-Saxon Weordan, to' 
become, German, Werden, then it is applicable enough to rhymes setting 
forth the future and spoken by the " weird sisters," who are so-called 
not because they are awful or nightmarish, or pokerish, or mystical, or 
bug-a-boorish, but simply because they predict the future or destiny of men. 
" The Athenians as well as Gentiles excelled in these songs of sorcery, hence 
we are told (Varro, " Q. de Fascin ") that in Achaia, when they learned that 
a certain woman who used them was an Athenian they stoned her to death, 
declaring that the immortal gods bestowed on man the power of healing with 
stones, herbs, and animals, not with words " (" De Rem. Superstit. Cognos 
cendis "). Truly, doctors never agree. 

It was in 1886 that I learned from a girl in Florence two exorcisms or 



44 GYPSY SORCERY. 

invocations which she was accustomed to repeat before telling fortunes by 
cards. This girl, who was of the Tuscan Romagna and who looked 
Etruscan with a touch of gypsy blood, was a repertory of popular super- 
stitions, especially witch-lore, and a maker and wearer of fetishes, always 
carrying a small bag full of them. Bon sang ne peut mentir. 

The two formulas were as follows. I omit a portion from each : — 

" Venti cinque carte siete ! 

Vend cinque diavoli diventerete, 

Diventerete, anderete 

Nel' corpo, nel' sangue nell' anima, 

Nell' sentimenti del corpo ; 

Del mio amante non posso vivere, 

Non passa stare ne bere, 

Ne mangiare ne . . . 

Ne con uomini ne con donne non passa favellare, 

Finche a la porta di casa mia 

Non viene picchiare ! " 

" Ye are twenty-five cards, 
Become twenty-five devils ! 

Enter into the body, into the blood, into the soul ; 
Into the feelings of the body 
Of my lover, from whom I cannot live. 
For I cannot stand (exist), or drink, 
Or eat . . . 

Nor can I converse with men or women 
Till at the door of my house 
He shall come to knock." 

The second incantation was the same, but beginning with these 
words : — 

" I put five fingers on the wall, 
I conjure five devils, 
Five monks and five friars, 
That they may enter the body 
Into the blood, into the soul," &c. 

If the reader will take Le Normant's « Magie Chaldaienne," and 



GYPSY CONJUGATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 45 

carefully compare these Italian spells with those of ancient Nineveh, he 
will not only find a close general resemblance, but all the several details or 
actual identity of words. And it is not a little curious that the same 
formulas which were repeated — 

" Once on a time when Babylon was young " — 

should still be current in Italy. So it passed through the ages — races came 
and went — and among the people the old sorcery was handed across and 
adown, so that it still lives. But in a few years more the Folk-lorist will 
be its only repository. 

This chapter is devoted to conjuring diseases of children by gypsies. 
It bears a great likeness to one in the very devout work of Peter 
Pipernus, " De Pueris affectis morbis magicis" (" Of Boys who have been 
Bewitched into Disease "), only that Pipernus uses Catholic incantations, 
which he also employs " pro ligatis in matrimonio," " pro incubo magico," 
" de doloribus stomachi magicis," &c, for to him, as he declares, all 
disease is of magic origin. 

The magic of the gypsies is not all deceit, though they deceive with it. 
They put faith themselves in their incantations, and practise them on their 
own account. "And they believe that there are women, and sometimes 
men, who possess supernatural power, partly inherited and partly acquired." 
The last of seven daughters born in succession, without a boy's coming 
into the series, is wonderfully gifted, for she can see hidden treasure or 
spirits, or enjoy second sight of many things invisible to men. And the 
same holds good for the ninth in a series of boys, who may become a seer 
of the same sort. Such a girl, i.e., a seventh daughter, being a fortune in 
herself, never lacks lovers. In 1883 the young Vojvode, or leader, of the 
Kukaya gypsy tribe, named Danku Niculai, offered the old gypsy 
woman, Pale Boshe, one hundred ducats if she would persuade her seventh 
daughter to marry him. In the United States of America there are many 
women who advertise in the newspapers that they also are seventh daughters 



46 GYPSY SORCERY. 

of seventh daughters at that, and who make a good thing of it as fortune- 
tellers ; but they have a far more speedy, economical, and effective way of 
becoming the last note in an octave, than by awaiting the slow processes 
of being begotten or born, inasmuch as they boldly declare themselves 
to be sevenths 3 which I am assured answers every purpose, as nobody 
ever asks to see their certificates of baptism any more than of 
marriage. 1 

Most of these witch-wives — also known in Hungary as cohalyi, or " wise 
women," or gule romni, "sweet" or "charming women" — are trained up from 
infancy by their mothers in medicine and magic. A great part of this 
education consists in getting by heart the incantations or formulas of which 
specimens will be given anon, and which, in common with their fairy tales, 
show intrinsic evidence of having been drawn at no very distant period from 
India, and probably in common with the lower or Shamanic religion of India 
from Turanian sources. But there is among the Hungarian gypsies a class 
of female magicians who stand far above their sisters of the hidden spell in 
power. These are the lace romni, or " good women," who draw their power 
directly from the Nivasi or Pchuvusi, the spirits of water and earth, or of 
flood and fell. For the Hungarian gypsies have a beautiful mythology of 
their own which at first sight would seem to be a composition of the 
Rosicrucian as set forth by Paracelsus and the Comte de Gabalis, with the 
exquisite Indo-Teutonic fairy tales of the Middle Ages. In fact, in some 
of the incantations used we find the Urme, or fairies, directly appealed to 
for help. 

With the gypsies, as among the early Accadians, diseases are supposed 
to be caused by evil supernatural influences. This is more naturally the 
case among people who lead very simple lives, and with whom sickness is 

1 Of the seventh son, Pipernus remarks in his book, "De Effectibus Magicis" (1647) : 
"Est ne sanandi superstitiosus modus eorum, qui orti sunt die Parasceves, et quotquot nullo 
fcemines sexu intercedente, ac ab ortu septimi masculi legitimo thoro sunt nati ? memorat 
Vairus, 1. de fascination e, II. Del Rius, lib. i., part 21. Garzonius nel Serraglio. J. C^sar 
Baricellus secundus scriptor in hort. geniale." 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 47 

not almost a natural or normal condition, as it is with ladies and gentlemen, 
or the inhabitants of cities, who have " always something the matter with 
them." Nomadic life is conducive to longevity. " Our grandfathers died 
on the gallows— we die from losing our teeth," said an old gypsy to Doctor 
von "Wlislocki, when asked what his age was. Therefore among all people 
who use charms and spells those which are devoted to cure occupy the 
principal position. However, the Hungarian Romany have many medicines, 
more or less mysterious, which they also apply in connection with the 
"healing rhymes." And as in the struggle for life the weakest go first to 
the wall, the remedies for the diseases of children are predominant. 

When a mother begins to suffer the pangs of childbirth, a fire is made 
before her tent, which is kept up till the infant is baptized, in order to drive 
away evil spirits. Certain women feed this fire, and while fanning it (fans 
being used for bellows) murmur the following rhyme : — 

" Oh yakh, oh yakh pcabuva, 

Pcabuva, 
Te cavestar tu trada, 

Tu trada, 
Pcuvushen te Nivashen 
Tire tcuva the traden ! 
Lace Urmen avena, 
Caves bactales dena, 
Kathe hin yov bactales, 
Andre lime bactales ! 
Motura te rana, 
Te atunci but' rana, 
Motura te rana, 
Te atunci, but' rana, 
Me dav' andre yakhera ! 
Oh yakh, oh yakh pcabuva, 
Rovel cavo : ashuna ! " 

It may here be remarked that the pronunciation of all these words is 
the same as in German, with the following additions . C— /<?/z in English, 
or to ch in church. C=ch in German as in Buch. J=azs, or the English 



4 s 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



j, in James ; n, as in Spanish, or nj in German, while sh and y are pronounced 
as in English. A is like ah. The literal translation is : — 

" Oh Fire, oh Fire, burn ! 

Burn ! 
And from the child (do) thou drive away 

Drive away ! 
Pcuvuse and Nivashi 
And drive away thy smoke (pi.) 
(Let) good fairies come (and) 
Give luck to the child, 
Here it is lucky (or fortunate) 
In the world fortunate 
Brooms and twigs (fuel) 
And then more twigs, 
And then yet more twigs 
I put (give) to the fire. 
Oh fire-, oh fire — burn ! 
The child weeps : listen ! " 

In South Hungary the gypsy women on similar occasions sing the 
following charm : — 

" Etta Pcuvusha, efta Nivasha 
Andre mal a vena. 
Pcabuven, pcabuven, oh yakha ! 
Dayakri punro dindalen, 
Te gule caves mudaren ; 
Pcabuven, pcabuven, oh yakha ; 
Ferinen o caves te daya ! " 

" Seven Pcuvushe, seven Nivasi 
Come into the field, 
Burn, burn, oh fire ! 
They bite the mother's foot, 
They destroy the sweet child; 
Fire, fire, oh burn ! 
Protect the child and the mother ! " 

When the birth is very difficult, the mother's relations come to help, 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 49 

and one of them lets an egg fall, zwischen den Beinen dersdben. On this 
occasion the gypsy women in Southern Hungary sing : — 

" Anro, anro in obles, 
Te e pera in obles : 
Ava cavo sastavestes ! 
Devla, devla, tut akharel ! " 

11 The egg, the egg is round, 
And the belly is round, 
Come child in good health ! 
God, God calls thee ! " 

If a woman dies in child-bed two eggs are place .1 under her arms 
.and the following couplet is muttered : — 

" Kana anro kirnes hin, 
Kathe nani tcuda hin ! " 

" When this egg is (shall be) decayed, 
Here (will be) is no milk ! " 

When the after-pains begin it is the custom with some of the 

(gypsy tribes in the Siebenburgen to smoke the sufferer with decayed 

willow-wood which is burned for the purpose while the women in 

attendance sing: — 

" Sik te sik o tcu ural, 
Te ural o con ural ! 
Kana len hadjinaven 
Sascipena tut' aven ; 
Kana o tcu na ural — 
Tute nani the dukhal, 
Tute nani the dukhal." 

"" Fast and fast the smoke flies, 
And flies, the moon flies, 
When they find (themselves) 
Health (yet) will come to thee, 
When the smoke no (longer) flics 
Thou wilt feel pain no more ! " 



5° 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



There is a strange, mysterious affinity between gypsies and the moon. 
A wonderful legend, which they certainly brought from India since 
in it Mekran is mentioned as the place where its incident occurred, 
details that there, owing to the misrepresentations of a sorcerer, the 
gypsy leader, Chen, was made to marry his sister Guin, or Kan, 
which brought the curse of wandering upon his people. Hence the 
Romany are called Chen-Guin. It is very evident that here we have 
Chon and Kan, or Kam, the Moon and Sun, which is confirmed by 
another gypsy legend which declares that the Sun, because he once 
violated or still seeks to seduce his sister, the Moon, continually follows 
her, being destined to wander for ever. And as the name Chen-Kan, or 
Zingan, or Zigeuner, is known all over the East, and, as this legend shows, 
is of Indian origin, it is hardly worth while to believe with Miklosich 
that it is derived from an obscure Greek heretical sect of Christians — the 
more so as it is most difficult to believe that the Romany were originally 
either Greeks or Christians or Christian heretics. 

When a gypsy woman is with child she will not, if she can help 
it, leave her tent by full moonshine. A child born at this time it is 
believed will make a happy marriage. So it is said of birth in the 
Western World : — 

" Full moon, high sea, 
Great man thou shalt be ; 
Red dawning, cloudy sky, 
Bloody death shalt thou die. 

"Pray to the Moon when she is round, 
Luck with you will then abound, 
What you seek for shall be found 
On the sea or solid ground.'' 

Moon-worship is very ancient ; it is alluded to as a forbidden 
thing in the Book of Job. From early times witches and other women 
worked their spells when stark-naked by the light of the full moon„ 
which is evidently derived from the ancient worship of that planet and the 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 51 

-shameless orgies connected with it. Dr. Wlislocki simply remarks on 
this subject that the moon has, in the gypsy incantation, " eine Phallische 
Bedeutung." In ancient symbolism the horns of the moon were regarded 
as synonymous with the horns of the ox — hence their connection with 
.agriculture, productiveness, and fertility, or the generative principle, and 
from this comes the beneficent influence not only of the horns, but of 
horse-shoes, boars' tusks, crabs' claws, and pieces of coral resembling them. 

The great love of gypsy mothers for their children, says Wlislocki, 
induces their friends to seek remedies for the most trifling disorders. At 
a later period, mother and child are left to Mother Nature — or the 
vis medicatrix Naturce. What is greatly dreaded is the Berufen, or 
being called on, " enchanted," in English " overlooked," or subjected 
to the evil eye. An universal remedy for this is the following : — 

A jar is filled with water from a stream, and it must be taken with, 
■not against, the current as it runs. In it are placed seven coals, seven 
handfuls of meal, and seven cloves of garlic, all of which is put on 
the fire. When the water begins to boil it is stirred with a three- 
forked twig, while the wise woman repeats : — 

" Misec' yakha tut dikhen, 
Te yon kathe mudaren ! 
Te atunci efta coka 
Te caven misece yakha ; 
Mise9' yakha tut dikhen, 
Te yon kathe mudaren ! 
But prahestar e yakha 
Atunci kores th'avena ; 
Misec' yakha tut dikhen 
Te yon kathe mudaren ! 
Pcabuvena pcabuvena 
Andre develeskero yakha ! " 

" Evil eyes look on thee, 

May they here extinguished be ! 
And then seven ravens 
Pluck out the evil eyes ; 



5 2 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Evil eyes (now) look on thee, 
May they soon extinguished be ! 
Much dust in the eyes, 
Thence may they become blind, 
Evil eyes now look on thee ; 
May they soon extinguished be ! 
May they burn, may they burn 
In the fire of God ! " 

Dr. Wlislocki remarks that the " seven ravens " are probably repre- 
sented by the seven coals, while the three-pointed twig, the meal and 
the garlic, symbolize lightning. He does not observe that the stick may 
be the tricula or trident of Siva — whence probably the gipsy word trushul y 
a cross ; but the connection is very obvious. It is remarkable that the 
gypsies assert that lightning leaves behind it a smell like that of garlic. 
As garlic forms an important ingredient in magic charms, the following 
from " The Symbolism of Nature " (" Die Symbolik und Mythologie 
der Natur"), by J. B. Friedrich, will be found interesting : — 

"We find in many forms spread far and wide the belief that garlic possesses the 
magic power of protection against poison and sorcery. This comes, according to Pliny,. 
from the fact that when it is hung up in the open air for a time, it turns black, when 
it is supposed to attract evil into itself — and, consequently, to withdraw it from the- 
wearer. The ancients believed that the herb which Mercury gave to Ulysses to protect 
him from the enchantment of Circe, and which Homer calls moly, was the ahum nigrum,, 
or garlic, the poison of the witch being a narcotic. Among the modern Greeks and 
Turks, garlic is regarded as the most powerful charm against evil spirits, magic, and 
misfortune. For this reason they carry it with them, and hang it up in their houses- 
as a protection against storms and bad weather. So their sailors carry with them a 
sack of it to avert shipwreck. If any one utters a word of praise with the intention of 
fascinating or of doing harm, they cry aloud ' Garlic ! ' or utter it three times rapidly.^ 
In Aulus Persius Flaccus (Satyr. V.) to bite garlic averts magic and the evils which 
the gods send to those who are wanting in reverence for them. According to a popular 
belief the mere pronunciation of ' Garlic ! ' protects one from poison." 

It appears to be generally held among them and the Poles that 
this word prevents children from " beschreien werden" that is, from 
being banned, or overlooked, or evil-eyed. And among the Poles garlic 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 55. 

is laid under children's pillows to protect them from devils and witches. 
(Bratraneck, " Beitrage zur JEsthetik der Pflanzenweit" p. 56). The 
belief in garlic as something sacred appears to have been very widely 
spread, since the Druids attributed magic virtues to it ; hence the 
reverence for the nearly allied leek, which is attached to King David 
and so much honoured by the Welsh. 

" Tell him I'll knock his leek about his pate 
Upon Saint David's Day." — Shakespeare. 

The magic virtues of garlic were naturally enough also attributed 
to onions and leeks, and in a curious Italian work, entitled " II Libro 
del Comando," attributed (falsely) to Cornelius Agrippa, I find the 
following : — 

" Segreto magico d'indovinare, colle cipole, la salute d^na persona lontana. A magic 
secret to divine with onions the health of a person far distant. Gather onions on the 
Eve of Christmas and put them on an altar, and under every onion write the name of 
the persons as to whom one desires to be informed, ancorche non scrivano, even if they 
do not write. 

"The onion (planted) which sprouts the first will clearly announce that the person 
whose name it bears is well. 

" And in the same manner we can learn the name of the husband or wife whom: 
we should choose, and this divination is in use in many cantons of Germany." 

Very much allied to this is the following love charm from an 
English gypsy : — 

"Take an onion, a tulip, or any root of the kind (i.e. a bulbous root?), and plant 
it in a clean pot never used before; and while you plant it repeat the name of the 
one whom you love, and every day, morning and evening, say over it : — 

"'As this root grows 

And as this blossom blows, 
May her heart be 
Turned unto me ! ' 



54 GYPSY SORCERY. 

"And it will come to pass that every day the one whom you love will be more 
and more inclined to you, till you get your heart's desire." 

A similar divination is practised by sowing cress or lettuce seed 
in the form of names in gardens. If it grows well the one who 
plants it will win the love of the person indicated. 

As regards the use of coals in incantations, Marcellus Burdi- 
■calensis, 1 a Latin physician of the third century, who has left us a 
-collection of Latin and Gaelic charms, recommends for a cure for tooth- 
ache : " Salis granum, panis micam, carbonem mortuum in phoenicio 
alligabis," i.e., to carry a grain of salt, a crumb of bread, and a coal, in 
a red bag. 

When the witch-brew of coals, garlic, and meal is made, and boiled 
-down to a dry residuum, it is put into a small three-cornered bag, and 
hung about the child's neck, on which occasion the appropriate rhyme 
is repeated nine times. " And it is of special importance that the 
bag shall be made of a piece of linen, which must be stolen, found, or 
begged." 

To learn whether a child has been overlooked, or evil-eyed, or 
enchanted, the " wise woman " takes it in her arms, and goes to the 
next running stream. There she holds the face of the babe as nearly 
as she can to the water, and repeats : — 

" Pani, pani sikova, 
Dikh the upre, dikh tele ! 
Buti pani sikovel 
Buti pal yakh the dikhel 
Te akana mudarel." 



1 "Uber Marcellus Burdigalensis, von Jacob Grimm. Gelesen in der Academie 
der Wissenschaften," 28 Juni, 1847 (Berlin. Dummler). In this work, as well as in 
the German Mythology, by the same author, and in Rudolf Roth's "Litteratur und 
Geschichte des Veda" (Stuttgart, 1846), the reader will find, as also in the works of the 
•elder Cato and Pliny, numbers of these incantations. 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 55: 

"Water, water, hasten! 
Look up, look down ! 
Much water hastens 
(May) as much come into the eye 
Which looked evil on thee, 
And may it now perish." 

If the running brook makes a louder sound than usual then it 
is supposed to say that the child is enchanted, but if it runs on as. 
before then something else is the matter, and to ascertain what it is, 
other charms and ceremonies are had recourse to. This incantation 
indicates, like many others, a constant dwelling in lonely places, by wood 
and stream, as gypsies wont to do, and sweet familiarity with Nature, 
until one hears sermons in stones, books in the running brooks, and 
voices in the wind. 1 Civilized people who read about Red Indian sor- 
cerers and gypsy witches very promptly conclude that they are mere 
humbugs or lunatics — they do not realize how these people, who pass 
half their lives in wild places watching waving grass and falling waters, 
and listening to the brook until its cadence speaks in real song, believe 
in their inspirations, and feel that there is the same mystical feeling and 
presence in all things that live and move and murmur as well as in them- 
selves. Now we have against this the life of the clubs and family, of 
receptions and business, factories and stock-markets, newspapers and 
" culture." Absolutely no one who lives in " the movement " can under- 
stand this sweet old sorcery. But nature is eternal, and while grass grows 
and rivers run man is ever likely to fall again into the eternal enchant- 
ments. And truly until he does he will have no new poetry, no fresh 

1 The divination by the running brook has been known in other lands. The 
Highlanders when they consulted an oracle took their seer, wrapped him in the hide 
of a newly-killed ox or sheep, and left him in some wild ravine by a roaring torrent 
to pass the night. From such sights and sounds there resulted impressions which were 
reflected in his dreams {Vide Scott, "Lady of the Lake," and notes). The fact that 
running water often makes sounds like the human voice has been observed by the 
Algonkin Indians of Maine and Nova Scotia {Vide "The Algonkin Legends of New 
England," by Charles G. Leland). 



5 6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

art, and must go on copying old ideas and having wretchedly worn-out 
.exhibitions in which there is not one original idea. 

If it appears that the child is overlooked, or " berufen," many 
means are resorted to, " one good if another fails," but we have here 
to do only with those which are connected with incantations. A favourite 
one is the following : Three twigs are cut, each one from a different tree, 
and put into a pipkin which has been filled with water dipped or drawn 
with, not against, the current of a stream. Three handfuls of meal 
are then put in and boiled down to a Brei, or pudding. A horse hair is 
then wound round a needle, which is stuck not by the point but by 
the head into the inner bottom of a tub^, which is filled with water, and 
placed upon this is the pipkin with the pudding. Then the " over- 
looked," or evil-seen child is held over the tub while the following 
rhyme is chanted : — ■ 

" Pani, pani lunjara, 
Pani, pani isbina ; 
Te nashvalipen cuca 
Nashvalipen mudara, 
Mudara te alcana, 
Kathe besha fiikana, 
Sar praytina sutyarel, 
Kathe andre piri, andre piri, 
Nivasheshe les davas ! " 

" Water, water, spread ! 
Water, water, stretch ! 
And sickness disappear, 
Sickness be destroyed, 
Be destroyed now. 
Remain not here at all! 
Who ever has overlooked this child 
As this leaf in the pot (maybe) 
Be given to the Nivashi ! " 

This is repeated nine times, when the water in the tub, with the 
pipkin and its contents, are all thrown into the stream from which the 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 57 

water was drawn. This is a widely-spread charm, and it is extremely 
ancient. The pipkin placed across the tub or trough — trog — here signifies 
a bridge, and Wlislocki tells us that no Transylvanian tent-gypsy will 
cross a bridge without first spitting thrice over the rails into the water. 
The bridge plays an important part in the mythology and Folk-lore of 
many races. The ancient Persians had their holy mountain, Albordi, 
or Garotman, the abode of gods and blessed souls, to which they passed 
by the bridge Cin-vat, or Chinevad, whence the creed : " I believe in 
the resurrection of the dead ; that all bodies shall live renewed again, 
.and I believe that by the bridge Cin-vat all good deeds will be rewarded, 
and all evil deeds punished." The punishment is apparent from the 
parallel of the bridge Al Sirat, borrowed by the Mahommedans from the 
Persians, over which the good souls passed to reward, and from which 
the wicked tumbled down into hell. 

When I first met Emerson in 1849 I happened to remark that a bridge 
in a landscape was like a vase in a room, the point on which an eye trained 
to the picturesque involuntarily rested. Nearly thirty years after, when we 
were both living at Shepherd's Hotel in Cairo, he reminded me of this one 
•day when by the Nile we were looking at a bridge. As a bridge must cross 
a stream, or a torrent which is generally beautiful by itself, and as the cross 
•or span has the effect of defining and framing the picture, as a circlet or 
tiara sets off a beautiful head, it is not remarkable that in all ages men have 
made such objects subjects of legend and song. Hence the oft-repeated 
Devil's Bridge, so-called because it seemed to simple peasants impossible for 
mere mortals to build, although bridges are habitually and more naturally 
connected with salvation and saints. He who in early ages built a bridge, 
did a great deed in times when roads were rare ; hence the great priest was 
called the Pontifex. 

Another spell for the purpose of averting the effects of the evil eye is 
as follows : The mother of the overlooked child fills her mouth with salt 
water, and lets it drop or trickle on the limbs of the infant, and when this 
has been done, repeats : — 

9 



GYPSY SORCERY. 

" Mise9 yakha tut dikhen 
Sar panori — 
Mudaren ! 

Nashvalipen prejia : 
Andral t'ro shero 
Andral t're kolyin, 
Andral t're por 
Andral t're punra 
Andral t're vasta 
Kathe prejanen, — 
Andre yakha yon janen ! " 

" False (evil) eyes see thee, 
Like this water 
May they perish ! 
Sickness depart 
From thy head, 
From thy breast, 
From thy belly, 
From thy feet, 
From thy hands, 
May they go hence 
Into the evil eyes ! '' 



It may be observed that meal forms an ingredient in several of these 
sorceries. It is a very ancient essential to sacrifices, and is offered to the 
spirits of the stream to appease them, as it was often given for the same 
purpose to the wind. The old Germans, says Pr^etorius, imagined the 
storm-wind as a starving, ravenous being, and sought to appease it by 
throwing meal to it. So it happened once even of later years near Bamberg 
when a mighty wind was raging one night that an old woman took her meal- 
bag and threw its contents out of the window, saying : — 



' Lege dich, lieber Wind, 
Bringe diss deinem Kind ! " 

' Dear Wind, be not so wild, 
Take that unto thy child !-"- 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 59 

"In which thing," adds the highly Protestant Pr^etorius (" Anthro- 
podemus Plutonicus," p. 429), "she was like the Papists who would 
fain appease the Donnerwetter, or thunderstorms, with the sound of baptized 
bells, as though they were raging round like famished lions, or grim 
wolves, or a soldier foraging, seeking what they may devour." The Wind 
here represents the Wild Hunter, or the Storm, the leader of the Wuthende 
Heer, or " raging army," who, under different names, is the hero of so 
many German legends. 

That the voice of the wind should seem like that of wild beasts 
roaring for food would occur naturally enough to any one who was familiar 
with both. 

When a child refuses the breast the gypsies believe that a Pcuvus-wife, 
or a female spirit of the earth has secretly sucked it. In such a case they 
place between the mother's breasts onions, and repeat these words : — 

" P9uvushi, Pcuvushi, 
Ac tu nashvalyi 
Tiro tcud ac yakha, 
Andre pcuv tu pcabuva ! 
Thavda, thavda miro tcud, 
Thavda, thavda, parno tcud, 
Thavda, thavda, sar kamav, — 
Mre caveske bokhale ! " 

"Earth-spirit! Earth-spirit! 
Be thou ill. 
Let thy milk be fire ! 
Burn in the earth ! 
Flow, flow, my milk ! 
Flow, flow, white milk ! 
Flow, flow, as I desire 
To my hungry child ! " 

The same is applied when the milk holds back or will not flow, as it is 
then supposed that a Pcuvus-wife has secretly suckled her own child at the 
mother's breast. It is an old belief that elves put their own offspring in 
the place of infants, whom they sometimes steal. This subject of elf- 



60 GYPSY SORCERY. 

changelings is extensively treated by all the writers on witchcraft. There 
is even a Latin treatise, or thesis, devoted to defining the legal and social 
status, rights, &c, of such beings. It is entitled, " De Infantibus Sup- 
posititiis, vulgo Wechsel-Balgen," Dresden, 1678. "Such infants," says 
the author (John Valentine Merbitz), " are called Cambiones, Vagiones 
(a continuo vagitu), Germanis Kiillkrapfe, Wechselkinder, Wechselbalge, 
all of which indicates, in German belief, children which have nothing 
human about them except the skin." 

When the child is subject to convulsive weeping or spasms, and loses 
its sleep, the mother takes a straw from the child's sleeping-place and puts 
into her mouth. Then, while she is fumigated with dried cow-dung, into 
which the hair of the father and mother have been mingled, she chants : — 

"Bala, bala pcubuven, 
Cik te bala pcubuven, 
Cik te bala pcubuven, 
Pcabuvel nashvalyipen ! " 

" Hair, hair, burn ! 
Dirt and hair burn ! 
Dirt and hair burn ! 
Illness be burned ! " 

This bears manifest mark of Hindoo origin, and I have no doubt that 
the same ceremony in every detail is practised in India at the present day. 
In Southern Hungary convulsive weeping in children is cured as follows : 
In the evening, when the fire burns before the tent, the mother takes her 
child in her arms and carries it three times around the fire, putting on it a 
pipkin full of water, into which she puts three coals. With this water she 
washes the head of her child, and pours some of it on a black dog. Then 
she goes to the next stream or brook, and lets fall into it a red twist, 
saying : — 

" Lava Nivashi ada bolditori te laha m're caveskro rovipen ! Kana sastavestes anav 
me tute pcabaya te yandra." 

"Nivashi take this twist, and with it the weeping of my child. When it is well 
I will bring thee apples and eggs." 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 61 

When a child " bumps " its head the swelling is pressed with the blade 
of a knife, and the following spell is muttered thrice, seven, or nine times, 
according to the gravity of the injury : — 

" Ac tu, ac tu, ac kovles, 
The may sik tu mudares ! 
Andre pcuv tu jia, 
Dikav tut me nikana ! 
Shuri, shuri ana, 
De pal pcuv ! " 

"Be thou, be thou, be thou weak (i.e., soft) 
And very soon perish ! 
Go thou into the earth, 
May I see thee never more ! 
Bring knives, knives, 
Give (i.e., put) into the earth." 

Then the knife is stuck three, seven, or nine times into the earth. If 
the child or a grown person has a bleeding at the nose, some of the blood is 
covered with earth, and the following verse repeated : — 

' ; Pcuvush, dav tute 
Pcuvush, lava mange, 
De tre caveske 
Hin may tate ! 
Sik lava ! " 

" Pcuvus, I give to thee, 
Pcuvus, oh take from me, 
Give it to thy child, 
It is very warm, 
Take it quickly ! " 

If the child has pains in the stomach, the hair of a black dog is burned 
to powder and kneaded with the mother's milk and some of the faces of 
the child into a paste. This prescription occurs in the magical medical 
formulas of Marcellus Burdigalenis, the court-physician at Rome in 
the fourth century: "Cape mel atticum et stercus infantis quod primum 



6 2 GYFSY SORCERY. 

demittit, statim ex lacte mulieris quoe puerum allactat permiscebis et sic 
inunges," &c. Most of the prescriptions of Marcellus were of ancient 
Etrurian origin, and I have found many of them still in use in the 
Romagna Toscana. This is put into a cloth and bound on the belly of 
the child. When it falls asleep a hole is bored in a tree and the paste put 
into it. The hole is then stopped up with a wooden plug, and while this 
is being done the following is repeated : — 

"Andral por prejia, 
Andre selene besha ! 
Besha besha tu kathe ! 
Penav, penav me tute ! " 

" Depart from the belly 
Live in the green ! (tree) 
Remain, remain thou here ! 
I say, I say to thee ' " 

The black dog is in many countries associated with sorcery and 
diabolical influences, and " in European heathendom it was an emblem of 
the evil principle. The black demon Cernobog was represented by the 
Slavs as a black dog. Among the Wallachians there is a horrible vampire- 
like creature called Priccolitsh, or Priculics, who appears as a man in fine 
healthy condition, but by night he becomes a dog, kills people by the mere 
touch, and devours them." The black dogs of Faust and of Cornelius 
Agrippa will occur to most readers. 

Gypsies have always been regarded as sorcerers and child-stealers, and 
it is remarkable that Lilith, the mother of all witchcraft, did the same. 
At the present day the Slavonian gypsies have spells against such a spirit. 

In the Chaldaean magic, as set forth by Lenormant, as I have already 
stated, the powers of evil are incarnate diseases, they are seven in number, 
and they are invoked by means of verses which bear an extraordinary 
resemblance to those which are still current in Italy as well as in other 
countries. According to some writers this is all mere chance coincidence, 
or due to concurrent causes and similar conditions in different countries. 



GYPSY CONJURATIONS AND EXORCISMS. 63 

That diseases, like hunger, or death, or the terrors of the night, may- 
have been incarnated as evil spirits naturally by all mankind may be 
granted, but when we find them arranged in categories of numbers, 
in widely different countries, employing the same means of banishing 
them — that is, by short songs and drum-beating — when we find these 
incantations in the same general forms, often with the same words, our 
belief as to the identity of origin is confirmed at every step. We 
can admit that the Jews were in Babylon and wandered thence all 
over the world, but that any other religious or superstitious system 
should have done the same would be obstinately denied. And by an 
incredible inconsistency, scholars who admit the early migrations of whole 
races on a vast scale, from the remotest regions of the East to Western 
Europe, deny that legends and myths come with them or that they could 
have spread in like manner. 

One of the attributes of the witch of the Middle Ages in which she 
has been confused with the Queen of the Fairies, and fairies in general, 
is that she steals newly-born children. This is a very ancient attribute 
of the female demon or sorceress or strega, and it is found among Jews 
at the present day who believe in the Benemmerinnen, or witches who 
haunt women in childbirth as well as in Lilith. " The Jews banish this 
first wife of Adam by writing on the walls, ' Adam chava chuz Lilith,' 
( c Keep away from here, Lilith ! ') " (" Anthropodemus Plutonicus," by 
John Prtetorius, 1666). That it is very ancient is rendered probable 
because the famous Bogomile formula of incantation against the twelve 
fever-fits {Tresevica), or kinds of fever, turns entirely on the legend of 
six children stolen by the demon who is compelled to restore them. 
Here we have the very oldest form of witchcraft known, that is incarnate 
disease in numbers allied to child-stealing. This spell of the Tresevica 
is attributed, says Dr. Gaster, to Pope Jeremia, the founder of Bogomilism 
(the great Oriental Slavonian heresy which spread over Europe in the 
Middle Ages and prepared the way for Protestanism). " There is no 
doubt, therefore, that the spell is derived from the East, and I have else- 



64 GYPSY SORCERY. 

where proved its existence in that quarter as early as the eighth century. 
It may have been of Manichasan origin. It has been preserved up to 
the present day in all the lands of Eastern Europe and, with certain 
modifications, exists among Germans and Jews." Though attributed to 
Sisynios, the immediate follower of Manes, as chief of the Manichasans, it 
seems to have been derived from an earlier Oriental tale which became the 
basis of all later formulas. I give it here in the Roumanian form, which 
closely resembles the old one. Here, as in all the other variants, the 
demon is a feminine one. The following is the legend : — 

"I, Sisveas, I came down from the Mount of Olives, saw the Archangel Gabriel 
as he met the Avestitza, wing of Satan, and seized her by the hair and asked her 
where she was going. And she answered that she was going to cheat the holy Virgin 
by her tricks, steal the new-born child, and drink its blood. The archangel asked her 
how she could get into houses so as to steal the children, and she answered that she 
changed herself into a fly or a cat or such forms. But whosoever knew her twelve 
and a half (nineteen) names and wrote them out she could not touch. She told him 
these names, and they were written down." 

There is a Coptic as well as a Greek parallel to this. The fairy 
who steals the children is called Lilith, and is further identified with 
Herodias and her twelve daughters as personifications of different kinds of 
fever. This is extremely interesting, as it casts some light on a question 
which has greatly puzzled all writers on witchcraft as to how or why Herodias 
was so generally worshipped in company with Diana by witches as a goddess 
in Italy. This is mentioned by Pipernus, Grillandus, Mirandola, and 
Horst. The name is probably much older than that of the Herodias of the 
New Testament. 




CHAPTER IV. 

SOUTH SLAVONIAN AND OTHER GYPSY WITCH-LORE. THE WORDS FOR A 

WITCH VILAS AND THE SPIRITS OF EARTH AND AIR WITCHES, EGG- 
SHELLS, AND EGG-LORE EGG PROVERBS OVA DE CRUCIBUS. 



HERE is current in the whole 
of the Southern Slavonian pro- 
vinces a vast mass of legends 
and other lore relating to 
witches, which, in the opinion 
of Dr. Friedrich S. Krauss, may also be 
regarded as Romany, since it is held in 
common with the gypsies. There can, 
indeed, be very little doubt that most of it 
was derived from, or disseminated by, them, 
since they have been the principal masters 
in magic and doctors in medicine in the 
Slavonic lands for many centuries. There 
are others deeply learned in this subject who 
share the same opinion, it being certain 
that the gypsies could hardly have a 
separate lore for themselves and one for magic practices on others, and 




66 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



I entertain no doubt that they are substantially the same ; but to avoid 
possible error and confusion, I give what I have taken in this kind from 
Dr. Krauss 1 and others by itself. 

As the English word witch, Anglo-Saxon Wicca, comes from a root 
implying wisdom, 2 so the pure Slavonian word vjestica, Bulgarian, vjescirica 
(masculine, viestae), meant originally the one knowing or well informed, 
and it has preserved the same power in allied languages, as Veaa (New 
Slovenish), knowledge, Vedavica, a fortune-teller by cards, Viedma (Russian), 
a witch, and Vedwin, fatidicus. In many places, especially in Dalmatia, 
witches are more gently or less plainly called Krstaca, the crossed, from 
Krst, a cross, i.e., xptcn-o?, or Rogulja, " horned," derived from association 
with the horns of devils. In Croatia the Italian Striga is used, while among 
the Slovenes and Kai-Kroats the term copernica (masculine, coprnjak). "But 
it enrages the witches so much to be called by this word that when they 
hear that any one has used it they come to his house by night and tear 
him in four pieces, which they cast afar into the four quarters of the earth, 
yea, and thereunto carry away all the swine, horses, and cattle, so intoler- 
able is their wrath." Therefore men use the word hmana zena, or 
" common woman," hmana being the Slavonic pronunciation of the German 
word gemein, or common. In Dalmatia and far into Servia a witch is- 
called macisnica, and magic, macija, which is, evidently enough, the Italian 
magia. But there are witches and witches, and it appears that among the 

1 " Sudslavische Hexensagen, Mittheilungen der Anthropologischen Gesellschaft in 
Wien." xiv. Bande, 1884. " Medizinische Zauberspruche aus Slavonien, Bosnien, der 
Hercegovina und Dalmatien." Wien, 1887. " Sreca, Gluck und Schicksal im Volksglauben 
der Siidslaven." Wien, 1886. "Sudslavische Pestsagen." Wien, 1883. 

2 " Witch. Mediaeval English wicche, both masculine and feminine, a wizard, a witch. 
Anglo-Saxon wicca, masculine, wicce, feminine. Wicca is a corruption of witga, commonly 
used as a short form of zoitega, a prophet, seer, magician, or sorcerer. Anglo-Saxon witan, 
to see, allied to witan, to know. Similarly Icelandic vitki, a wizard, is from vita, to know. 
Wizard, Norman-French wiscbard, the original Old French being guiscart, sagacious. 
Icelandic, vizkr, clever or knowing, . . . with French suffix ard as German hart, hard,, 
strong" (Skeat, " Etymol. Dictionary"). That is wiz-ard, very wise. Wit and wisdom here. 
are near allied to witchcraft, and thin partitions do the bounds divide. 



SOUTH SLAVONIAN AND OTHER GYPSY WITCH-LORE. 67 

learned the vjestica differs from the macionica, and this from the Zlokobnica 
who, as the " evil-meeter," or one whom it is unlucky to encounter in the 
.morning, is probably only one who has the evil eye. A quotation from a 
•Servian authority, given by Dr. Krauss, is as follows : — 

"I have often heard from old Hodzas and Kadijas, that every female Wallach, 
.as soon as she is forty years old, abandons the 'God be with us!' and becomes a 
witch {vjestica), or at least a zlokobnica or macionica. A real witch has a mark of a 
•cross under her nose, a zlokobnica has some hairs of a beard, and a macionica may be 
'known by a forehead full of dark folds (frowns), with blood-spots in her face " (" Niz 
jrpskih pripoviedaka. Vuk. vit. Vecevica. Pancevo," p, 93. 1881). 

Of the great number of South Slavonian terms for the verb to 
enchant or bewitch, it may suffice to say that the commencement, carati, 
cari carani, carovnik, &c ., appear to have much more affinity to the 
gypsy chor-ava, to steal or swindle, and chov-hani, a witch, than to the 
Italian ciarlatano, and the French and English charlatan^ from which 
Dr. Krauss derives them. 

The Vilas-Sylvana Elementary Spirits. 

Among the Slavonic and gypsy races all witchcraft, fairy- and Folk- 
lore rests mainly upon a belief in certain spirits of the wood and wold, 
of earth and water, which has much in common with that of the Rosi- 
•crucians and Paracelsus, but much more with the gypsy mythology 
•(as given by Wlislocki, " Vom Wandernden Zigeunervolke," pp. 49-309), 
which is apparently in a great measure of directly Indian origin. 

"In the Vile," says Dr. Krauss, "also known as Samovile, Samodivi, 
.and Vilevrjaci, we have near relations to the forest and field spirits, or 
the ' wood- ' and ' moss-folk ' of Middle Germany, France, and Bavaria ; 
the ' wild people ' of Eifel, Hesse, Salzburg, and the Tyrol ; the wood- 
women and wood-men of Bohemia ; the Tyrolese Fanggen, F'dnken, Nb'rkel, 
.and Happy Ladies ; the Roumanish Orken, Euguane, and Dialen ; the Danish 
Ellekoner ; the Swedish Skogsnufvaz ; and the Russian Ljesje ; while in 
vcertain respects they have affinity with the Teutonic Valkyries." Yet they 



68 GYPSY SORCERY. 

differ on the whole from all of these, as from English fairies, in being- 
more like divinities, who exert a constant and familiar influence for good 
or evil on human beings, and who are prayed to or exorcised on all 
occasions. They have, however, their exact parallel among the Red Indians 
of North America as among the Eskimo, and it is evident that they are 
originally derived from the old or primeval Shamanic faith, which once 
spread all over the earth. It is very true, as Dr. Krauss remarks, that 
in the West of Europe it is becoming almost impossible to trace this true- 
origin of spirits now regarded as merely diabolical, or otherwise put into 
new roles; but among the South Slavonians and gypsies we can still find 
them in very nearly their old form and playing the same parts. We 
can still find the Vila as set forth in old ballads, the incarnation ot beauty 
and power, the benevolent friends of sufferers, the geniuses of heroes, the 
dwellers by rock and river and greenwood tree. But they are implacable 
in their wrath to all who deceive them, or who break a promise ; nay,, 
they inflict terrible punishment even on those who disturb their rings or the 
dances which they make by midsummer moonlight. Hence the proverb 
applied to any man who suddenly fell ill : " Naiso je na vilinsko kolo "' 
("He stepped on a fairy-ring"). From this arbitrary exercise of power 
we find the Vila represented at times as a spirit who punishes and 
torments. 

Thus we are told that there was .once a shepherd named Stanko,, 
who played beautifully on the flute. One evening he was so absorbed 
in his own music that when the Ave Maria bell rung, instead of repeating 
the prayer he played it. As he ended he saw a Vila sitting on a hedge. 
And from that hour she never left him. By table, by his bed, at work 
or play, the white form and unearthly eyes of the spirit were close 

to him. 

" By a spell to him unknown, 
He could never be alone." 

Witches and wizards were summoned to aid him, but to no avail ; 
nay, it made matters worse, for the Vila now often beat him, and when 



SOUTH SLAVONIAN AND OTHER GYPSY WITCH-LORE. 69 

people asked him why it was, he replied that the Vila did so because 
he refused to wander out into the world with her. And yet again he 
would be discovered in the top of a tree, bound with bast ; and so it 
went on for years, till he was finally found one morning drowned in a 
ditch. So in the Wolf Dietrich legend the hero refuses the love of die 
rauhe Else, and is made mad by the witch and runs wild. All of 
which is identical with what is told in an Algonkin tale (vide " The 
Algonkin Legends of New England "). 

There are three kinds of witches or spirits among the Southern 
Slavonians which correspond in every respect exactly to those in which the 
gypsies believe. The first of these are the Zracne Vile, or aerial spirits. These, 
like the spirits of the air of Scripture, are evily-disposed to human beings, 
playing them mischievous tricks or inflicting on them fatal injuries. They 
lead them astray by night, like Friar Rush and Robin Goodfellow, or the 
English gypsy Mullo doods, or bewilder and frighten them into mad- 
ness. Of the second kind are the Earth spirits, Pozemne Vile, in gypsy 
Pcuvushi or Pilvushi. These are amiable, noble, and companionable 
beings, who often give sage counsel to men. Thirdly are the Water 
sprites, in Slavonic Povodne Vile, in gypsy Nivashi, who are to the 
highest degree vindictive at times, yet who behave kindly to men when 
they meet them on land. But woe to those who, while swimming, encounter 
them in streams or lakes, for then the goblins grasp and whirl them about 
until they perish. From this account by Dr. Krauss, it appears as if 
this Slavonic mythology were derived from the gypsy, firstly, because it is 
more imperfect than the latter, and secondly, because in it Vilas, or 
spirits, are confused with witches, while among the gypsies they are clearly 
separated and distinctly defined. 

Dr. Wlislocki says (" Vom Wand. Zigeunervolke," p. 253) that 
" gypsies are still a race given to Shamanism, but yet they reverence a 
highest being under the name of devla or del." This is, however, the 
case to-day with all believers in Shaman or Sorcery-religion, the difference 
between them and monotheists being that this highest god is little wor- 



7 o GYPSY SORCERY. 

shipped or even thought of, all practical devotion being paid to spirits 
who are really their saints. By close examination the Gypsy religion, like 
that of the country-folk in India, appears to be absolutely identical in 
spirit with that of American Indians. And I should say that the monk 
mentioned by Pr^torius, who declared that though God and Christ 
■should damn him, yet he could be saved by appealing to Saint Joseph, 
was not very far removed from being a Shamanist. 

The Hungarian gypsies are divided into tribes, and one of these, the 
Kukaya, believes itself to be descended from the Pfuvushi, or earth- 
airies, according to the following story, narrated by Dr. H. von 
Wlislocki in his paper on the genealogy and family relations of the 
Transylvanian Tent Gypsies : — 

"Many thousand years ago there were as yet in the world very few Pchuvushi. These 
■are beings of human form dwelling under the earth. There they have cities, but they 
very often come to the world above. They are ugly, and their men are covered with 
hair. (All of this indicates a prehistoric subterranean race like the Eskimo, fur-clad. 1 ) 
They carry off mortal girls for wives. Their life is hidden in the egg of a black hen." 

This is the same as that of the Oreo or Ogre in the Italian tale, 
"I Racconti delle Fate, Cesare da Causa," Florence, 1888. Whoever 
kills the hen and throws the egg into a running stream, kills the 

pchuvush. 

" Once a young Pchuvush woman came up to the world and sat in a fair green forest. 
■She saw a very beautiful youth sleeping in the shade, and said : 'What happiness it must be 
to have such a husband. Mine is so ugly ! ' Her husband, who had stolen silently after her, 
heard this, and reflected : 'What a good idea it would be to lend my wife to this young man 
till she shall have borne a family of beautiful children ! Then I could sell them to my rich 
Pchuvus friends.' So he said to his wife : ' You may live with this youth for ten years if 
you will promise to give me either the boys or the girls which you may bear to him.' She 
agreed to this. Then the Pchuvus began to sing : — 



1 For a very interesting account of the mysterious early dwarfs of Great Britain the 
reader may consult "Earth Houses and their Inhabitants," by David MacRitchie, in "The 
Testimony of Tradition." London: Trubner and Co., 1800. 



SOUTH SLAVONIAN AND OTHER GYPSY WITCH-LORE. 71 

"'Kuku, kukaya 

Karnes to adala ? 

Kuku, kukaya.' 
" That is in English : — 

'" Kuku, kukaya 

Do you want this (one) here \ 

Kuku, kukaya.' 

" Then the young man awoke, and as the goblin offered him much gold and silver with 
his wife, he took her and lived with her ten years, and every year she bore him a son. Then- 
came the Pchuvush to get the children. But the wife said she had chosen to keep all the 
sons, and was very sorry but she had no girls to give him ! So he went away sorrowfully, 
howling : — 

" ' Kuku, kukaya ! 
Ada kin jirkla ! 
Kuku, kukaya ! ' 
" That is to say : — 

" ' Kuku, kukaya ! 

These are dogs here ! 
Kuku, kukaya ! ' 

" Then the ten boys laughed and said to their father : ' We will call ourselves Kukaya.'' 
And so from them came the race." 

Dr. Wlislocki points out that there are races which declare themselves 
to be descended from dogs, or, like the Romans, from wolves. It is a 
curious coincidence that the Eskimo are among the former. 

In all parts of Eastern Europe, as in the West, many people are not 
only careful to burn the parings of their nails l and the combings of hair, 
for fear lest witches and imps should work sorcery with them to the injury 
of those from whom they came, but they also destroy the shells of eggs 
when they have eaten their contents. So A. Wuttke tells us in his book, 

1 The many superstitions relating to cutting nails may be referred in part to the very 
wild legend of the ship Nagifara given in Sturleson's "Edda." 

" Then in that Twilight of the Gods (the Norse Day of Judgment) will come the ship 
Naglfara, which is made of dead men's nails. In that sea it will go forth. Hrymer steereth 
it. And for this cause no man should die with his nails unshorn, for so the ship is made, and 
the gods would fain put that off as lone as possible " (" Edda, Gylfesgynning," 26th talc). 



72 GYPSY SORCERY. 

"Der Deutsche Volks Aberglaube der Gegenwart," 1869: " When one has 
eaten eggs the shells must be broken up or burned, or else the hens will 
lay no more, or evil witches will come over them." And in England, 
.Spain, the Netherlands, or Portugal, there are many who believe or say 
that if the witches can get such shells from which people have eaten, 
unbroken, they can, by muttering spells, cause them to grow so large 
that they can use them as boats. Dom Leitas Ganet (" Donna Branca 
ou a Conquista do Algarre," Paris, 1826), however, assures us that is 
a very risky thing for the witches, because if they do not return home 
before midnight the shell-boat perishes, " whence it hath come to pass that 
many of these sorceresses have been miserably drowned." 

However, an egg hung up in a house is a lucky amulet, hence the 
ostrich eggs and cocoanuts resembling them which are so common in the 
East. And it is to be observed that every gypsy in England declares 
that a pivilioi, or cocoanut, as a gift brings bak or luck, I myself having 
had many given to me with this assurance. This is evidently and directly 
derived from India, in which country there are a mass of religious traditions 
referring to it. 

" Once there was a gypsy girl who noticed that when anybody ate eggs they broke 
up the shells, and asking why this was done received for answer : — 

" ' You must break the shell to bits for fear 

Lest the witches should make it a boat, my dear. 
For over the sea away from home, 
Far by night the witches roam.' 

" Then the girl said : ' I don't see why the poor witches should not have boats as well as 
other people.' And saying this she threw the shell of an egg which she had been eating as 
far as she could, and cried, ' Chovihani, lav tro bero ! ' (' Witch — there is your boat ! ') But 
what was her amazement to see the shell caught up by the wind and whirled away on high 
till it became invisible, while a voice cried, ' Paraka! ' (' I thank you ! ') 

" Now it came to pass some time after that the gypsy girl was on an island, where she 
remained some days. And when she wished to return, behold a great flood was rising, and it 
had washed her boat away, she could see nothing of it. But the water kept getting higher 
and higher, and soon there was only a little bit of the island above the flood, and the girl 
■thought she must drown. Just then she saw a white boat coming ; there sat in it a woman 






SOUTH SLAVONIAN AND OTHER GYPSY WITCH-LORE. 73 

with witch eyes ; she was rowing with a broom, and a black cat sat on her shoulder. 'Jump 
in ! ' she cried to the girl, and then rowed her to the firm land. 

" When she was on the shore the woman said : ' Turn round three times to the right and 
look every time at the boat.' She did so, and every time she looked she saw the boat grow 
smaller till it was like an egg. Then the woman sang : — 

'"That is the shell you threw to me, 
Even a witch can grateful be.' 

" Saying this she vanished, cat, broom, shell, and all. 

" Now my story is fairly done, 
I beg you to tell a better one." 

As regards these boats which grow large or small at will we find 
them in the Norse ship Skidbladner, which certain dwarfs made and gave 
to Frey. It is so large that all the gods and their army can embark in it. 
But when not in use it may be so contracted that one may hava i fungi 
sino — put it in his purse or pocket. The Algonkin god Glooskap has 
not only the counterpart of Skidbladnir, but the hammer of Thor and 
his belt of strength. He has also the two attendant birds which bring 
him news, and the two wolves which mean Day and Night. 

Another legend given by Dr. Krauss, relative to witches and egg- 
shells is as follows : — 

" By the Klek lived a rich tavern-keeper and his wife. He was thin and lean — 
hager und mager — while she was as fat as a well-fed pig. 

" One day there came a gypsy woman by. She began to tell his fortune by his hand. 
And as she studied it seriously she became herself serious, and then said to him, ' Listen, 
you good-natured dolt {more)! Do you know why you are so slim and your wife so 
stout?' 'Not I.' 'My good friend (Latcho pral), your wife is a witch. Every 
Friday when there is a new moon {inladi petal;) she rides you up along the Klek to 
the devil's dance' (Uraze kolo). 'How can that be?' 'Simply enough. As soon as 
you fall asleep, she slips a magic halter over your head. Then you become fa horse, 
and she rides you over the hills and far away over mountains and woods, cities and seas, 
to the witches' gathering. 



' Little you know where you have been, 
Little you think of what you have seen, 



For when you awake it is all forgotten, but the ride is hard for you, and you are 

11 



74 GYPSY SORCERY. 



casting away, and dying. Take great care of yourself on the next Friday when there 



a new moon 



"So the gypsy went her way, and he thought it over. On the next Friday when 
the moon was new he went to bed early, but only pretended to sleep. Then his 
wife came silently as a cat to the bed-side with the magic halter in her hand. As quick 
as lightning he jumped up, snatched it from her, and threw it over her head. Then 
she became, in a second, a mare. He mounted her, and away she flew through the 
air — over hills and dales like the wind, till they came to the witches' meeting. 

"He dismounted, bound the mare to a tree, and, unseen by the company, watched 
them at a little distance. All the witches carried pots or jars. First they danced 
in a ring, then every one put her pot on the ground and danced alone round it. And 
these pots were egg-shells. 

"While he watched, there came flying to him a witch in whom he recognized his 
old godmother. 'How did you come here?' she inquired. ' Well, I came here on my 
mare, I know not how.' ' Woe to you — begone as soon as possible. If the witches, 
once see you it will be all up with you. Know that we are all waiting for one' (this 
one was his wife), 'and till she comes we cannot begin.' Then the landlord mounted 
his mare, cried ' Home ! ' and when he was there tied her up in the stable and went to- 
bed. 

"In the morning his servant-man said to him: 'There is a mare in the stable.' 
'Yes,' replied the master; 'it is mine.' So he sent for a smith, and made him shoe 
the mare. Now, whatever is done to a witch while she is in the form of an animal 
remains on or in her when she resumes her natural shape. 

" Then he went out and assembled a judicial or legal commission. He led the 
members to his house, told them all his story, led forth the mare, and took off the halter. 
She became a woman as before, but horse-shoes were affixed to her feet and hands. 
She began to weep and wail, but the judge was pitiless. He had her thrown into a 
pit full of quicklime, and thus she was burnt to death. And since that time people 
break the shells of eggs after eating their contents, lest witches should make jars or 
pots of them." 

The following story on the same subject is from a different source : — ■ 

"There was once a gypsy girl who was very clever, and whenever she heard 
people talk about witches she remembered it well. One day she took an egg-shell and 
made a small round hole in it very neatly, and ate the yolk and white, but the shell' 
she put on a heap of white sand by a stream, where it was very likely to be seen. 
Then she hid herself behind a bush. By and by, when it was night, there came- 
a witch, who, seeing the shell, pronounced a word over it, when it changed to a 
beautiful boat, into which the witch got and sailed on the water, over the sea. 

"The girl remembered the word, and soon ate another egg and turned it into a: 



SOUTH SLAVONIAN AND OTHER GYPSY WITCH-LORE. 75 

boat. Whenever she willed it went over the world to places where fruit and floweis 
abounded, or where people gave her much gold for such things as knives and scissors. 
So she grew rich and had a fine house. The boat she hid away carefully in a bush. 

" There was a very envious, wicked woman, whom the girl had befriended many 
a time, and who hated her all the more for it. And this creature set to work, spying and 
sneaking, to find out the secret of the girl's prosperity. And at last she discovered the 
boat, and, suspecting something, hid herself in the bush hard by to watch. 

" By and by the girl came with a basket full of wares for her trade, and, drawing 
out the boat, said, ' To Africa ! ' — when off it flew. The woman watched and waited. 
After a few hours the girl returned. Her boat was full of fine things, ostrich feathers and 
gold, fruit and strange flowers, all of which she carried into her house. 

"Then the woman put the boat on the water, and said, 'To Africa!' But she 
did not know the word by means of which it was changed from an egg-shell, and which 
made it fly like thought. So as it went along the woman cried, 'Faster!' but it 
never heeded her. Then she cried again in a great rage, and at last exclaimed, 
•' In God's name get on with you ! ' Then the spell was broken, and the boat turned 
into an egg-shell, and the woman was drowned in the great rolling sea." 

Egg-lore is inexhaustible. The eggs of Maundy Thursday {Witten 
Donnertag), says a writer in The ghteen, protect a house against thunder 
and lightning, but, in fact, an egg hung up is a general protection, hence 
the ostrich eggs and cocoanuts of the East. Some other very interesting 
items in the communication referred to are as follows : — 

" Witches and Eggs. — ' To hang an egg laid on Ascension Day in the roof of a 
house,' says Reginald Scot in 1584, 'preserveth the same from all hurts.' Probably 
this was written with an eye to the ' hurts ' arising from witchcraft, in connection with 
which eggs were supposed to possess certain mysterious powers. In North Germany, 
if you have a desire to see the ladies of the broomstick on May Day, their festival, you 
must take an egg laid on Maundy Thursday, and stand where four roads meet ; 
or else you must go into church on Good Friday, but come out before the blessing. It 
was formerly quite an article of domestic belief that the shells must be broken after 
eating eggs, lest the witches should sail out to sea in them ; or, as Sir Thomas Browne 
declared, lest they ' should draw or prick their names therein, and veneficiously mischief ' 
the person who had partaken of the egg. North Germans, ignoring this side of 
the question, say, ' Break the shells or you will get the ague;" and Netherlanders advise 
you to secure yourself against the attacks of this disagreeable visitor by eating on Easter 
Day a couple of eggs which were laid on Good Friday. 

" Scottish Superstitions. — Scotch fishers, who may be reckoned among the most 
superstitious of folks, believe that contrary winds and much consequent vexation of 



7 6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

spirit will be the result of having eggs on board with them ; while in the west of 
England it is considered very unlucky to bring birds' eggs into the house, although they 
may be hung up with impunity outside. Mr. Gregor, in his ' Folklore of the North- 
East of Scotland,' gives us some curious particulars concerning chickens, and. the 
best methods of securing a satisfactory brood. The hen, it seems, should be set on 
an odd number' of eggs, or the chances are that most, if not all, will be addled — a mourn- 
ful prospect for the henwife ; also they must be placed under the mother bird after 
sunset, or the chickens will be blind. If the woman who performs this office carries 
the eggs wrapped up in her chemise, the result will be hen birds ; if she wears a man's 
hat, cocks. Furthermore, it is as well for her to repeat a sort of charm, 'A' in the- 
geethir, A' oot thegeethir.' 

"Unlucky; Eggs. — There are many farmers' wives, even in the present day, who 
would never dream of allowing eggs to be brought into the house or taken out after 
dark — this being deemed extremely unlucky. Cuthbert Bede mentions the case of 
a farmer's wife in Rutland who received a setting of ducks' eggs from a neighbour at 
nine o'clock at night. 'I cannot imagine how she could have been so foolish,' said 
the good woman, much distressed, and her visitor, upon inquiry, was told that ducks' 
eggs brought into a house after sunset would never be hatched. A Lincolnshire super- 
stition declares that if eggs are carried over running water they will be useless for setting 
purposes ; while in Aberdeen there is an idea prevalent among the country folks that should 
it thunder a short time before chickens are hatched, they will die in the shell. The 
same wiseacres may be credited with the notion that the year the farmer's gudewife 
presents him with an addition to his family is a bad season for the poultry yard. 
'Bairns an' chuckens,' say they, ' dinna thrive in ae year.' The probable explanation 
being that the gudewife, taken up with the care of her bairn, has less time to attend to 
the rearing of the 'chuckens.' 

" Fortune-telling in Northumberland. — Besides the divination practised with the 
white of an egg, which certainly appears of a vague and unsatisfactory character, another 
species of fortune-telling with eggs is in vogue in Northumberland on the eve of St. Agnes. 
A maiden desirous of knowing what her future lord is like, is enjoined to boil an egg, 
after having spent the whole day fasting and in silence, then to extract the yolk, fill the 
cavity with salt, and eat the whole, including the shell. This highly unpalatable supper 
finished, the heroic maid must walk backwards, uttering this invocation to the saint : — 

" ' Sweet St. Agnes, work thy fast, 
If ever I be to marry man, 
Or man be to marry me, 
I hope him this night to see.' " 

Friedrich and others assert that the saying in Luke xi. 12 — "Or 
if he shall ask an egg shall he give him 



SOUTH SLAVONIAN AND OTHER GYPSY WITCH-LORE. 77 

reference to ancient belief that the egg typified the good principle, and 
the scorpion evil, and which is certainly supported by a cloud of 
witnesses in the form of classic folk-lore. The egg, as a cosmogenic 
symbol, and indicating the origin of all things, finds a place in the 
mythologies of many races. These are indicated with much erudition 
by Friedrich, " Symbolik der Natur," p. 686. 

In Lower Alsatia it is believed that if a man will take an Easter 
egg into the church and look about him, if there be any witches in the 
congregation he may know them by their having in their hands pieces 
of pork instead of prayer-books, and milk-pails on their heads for 
bonnets (Wolf, " Deutsche Mahrchen und Sagen," p. 270). There is 
also an ancient belief that an egg built into a new building will protect 
it against evil and witchcraft. Such eggs were found in old houses in 
Altenhagen and Iserlohen, while in the East there is a proverb, " the egg 
of the chamber" (" Hamasa " of Abu Temman, v. Ruckert, Stuttgart, 
1846), which seems to point to the same practice. 

The Romans expressed a disaster by saying, " Ovum ruptum est " 
("The egg is smashed"). Among other egg-proverbs I find the following : — 



His eggs are all omelettes [French) ; i.e., broken up. 

Eggs in the pan give pancakes but nevermore chicks (Low German). 

Never a chicken comes from broken eggs {Low German). 

Bad eggs, bad chickens. Hence in America "a bad egg" for a man who is radically 
bad, and "a good egg" for the contrary. 

Eggs not yet laid are uncertain chickens; i.e., "Do not count your chickens before 
they are hatched." 

Tread carefully among eggs (German). 

The egg pretends to be cleverer than the hen. 

He waits for the eggs and lets the hen go. 

He who wants eggs must endure the clucking of the hen [Westphalian). 

He thinks his eggs are of more account than other people's hens. 

One rotten egg spoils all the pudding. 

Rotten eggs and bad butter always stand by one another ; or "go well together." 
Old eggs, old lovers, and an old horse, 
Are either rotten or for the worse. 



7 8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

(Original : 

Alte Eyer 

Alte Freier — 

Alter Gaul 

Sind meistens faul.) 
"All eggs are of the same size" (Eggs are all alike), he said, and grabbed the 
biggest. 

As like as eggs (Old Roman). 

As sure as eggs. 

His eggs all have two yolks. 

If you have many eggs you can have many cakes. 

He who has many eggs scatters many shells. 

To throw an egg at a sparrow. 

To borrow trouble for eggs not yet hatched. 

Half an egg is worth more than all the shell. 

A drink after an egg, and a leap after an apple. 

A rotten egg in his face. 

In the early mythology, the egg, as a bird was hatched from it, and 
as it resembled seeds, nuts, &c, from which new plants come, was regarded 
as the great type of production. This survives in love-charms, as when 
a girl in the Tyrol believes she can secure a man's love by giving him 
a red Easter egg. This giving red eggs at Easter is possibly derived 
from the ancient Parsees, who did the same at their spring festival. 
Among the Christians the reproductive and sexual symbolism, when re- 
tained, was applied to the resurrection of the body and the immortality 
of the soul. Hence Easter eggs. And as Christ by His crucifixion caused 
this, or originated the faith, we have the ova de crucibus, the origin of 
which has puzzled so many antiquaries ; for the cross itself was, like 
the egg, a symbol of life, in earlier times of reproduction, and in a later 
age of life eternal. These eggs are made of a large size of white glass 
by the Armenian Christians. 




LAPLAND MAGIC DRUM. 



placed 



CHAPTER V. 

CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 

;ROM the earliest ages a drum or tam- 
bourine has formed such an indispen- 
sable adjunct of Shamanic sorcery 
among Tartars, Lapps, Samoyedes, 
Eskimo, and Red Indians, that, taking 
it with other associations, I can hardly 
believe that it has not been trans- 
mitted from one to the other. In 
Hungary the gypsies when they wish 
to know if an invalid will recover, 
have recourse to the covaganescro 
bu^lo (chovihanescro buklo) or "witch- 
drum." This is a kind of rude tam- 
bourine covered with the skin of an 
animal, and marked with stripes which 
have a special meaning. On this are 
from nine to twenty-one seeds of the thorn-apple (stramomium). 




8o GYPSY SORCERY. 

The side of the drum is then gently struck with a little hammer, and 

according to the position which the seeds take on the marks, the 

recovery or death of the patient is predicted. The following is a picture 
of a gypsy drum as given by Dr. Wlislocki. 




The wood for this is cut en Whitsunday. A is turned towards the fortune- 
teller ; nine seeds are now thrown on the drum, and with the left hand, 
or with a hammer held in it, the tambourine is tapped. Should all the 
seeds come within the four lines all will go well, especially if three come 
within a, d, e, f. If two roll into the space between a, i, it is lucky 
for a woman, between i and / for a man. But if nearly all fall outside 
of b, c, g, h, all is unfavourable. The same divination is used to 
know whether animals will get well, and where stolen property is 
concealed. All of this corresponds exactly to the use of the same 
instrument by the Laplanders for the same purposes. The thorn-apple 
is a very poisonous plant, and the gypsies are said to have first brought 
it to England. This is not true, but it is extremely possible that they 
used it in stupefying, killing, and " bewitching." It is very much 
employed at present by the Voodoo poisoners in America. 

The Turks are a Tartar race, and the drum is used among them 
very generally for magical purposes. I have one of these tambouri which, 
I was assured when I bought it, was made for incantations. It is of 
a diamond shape, has parchment on both sides, and is inscribed with the 
name Allah, in Arabic, and the well-known double triangle of Solomon, 
with the moon and star. 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 81 

To keep domestic animals from straying or being stolen, or falling 
ill, they are, when a gypsy first becomes their owner, driven up before 
a fire by his tent. Then they are struck with a switch, which is half 
blacked with coal, across the back, while the following is repeated : — 

" Ac tu, ac kathe ! 
Tu hin mange ! 
Te Nivasa the jianen — 
Na dikh tu adalen ! 
Trin lanca hin mange, 
Me pcandav tute : 
Yeka o devla, avri 

Kristus, trite Maria ! " 

" Stay thou, stay here ! 
Thou art mine ! 

And the Nivasi when they go — 
Thou shalt not see them! 
Three chains I have, 

1 bind thee : 

One is God, the other (beyond) 
The Christ, the third, Maria ! " 

To charm a horse, they draw, with a coal, a ring on the left 
hoof and on the right a cross, and murmur : — 

" Obles, obles te obles ! 
Ac tu, ac tu may sastes 
Na th' avehas beng tute 
Devla, devla ac tute ! 
Gule devla bishala 
E grayeskro pera 
Misecescro dad ! 
Niko manushenge ac 
Kaske me dav, leske at- 
Shukares tu ac, 
Voyesa te laces ac, 
Ashunen efta Pcuvuse : 
Efta lanca hin mange, 
Ferinen adala 
Taysa, taysa e peda ! " 

12 



2,2 GYPSY SORCERY. 

" Round, round, and round ! 
Be thou, be thou very sound 
The devil shall not come to thee, 
God, God shall be with thee ! 
Sweet God drive away 
From the horse's body 
The Father of Evil ! 
Be to (go not to) any other man 
To whom I give (sell) unto him> 
Be beautiful ! 
Frolicsome and good, 
Seven spirits of earth hear ! 
I have seven chains, 
Protect this animal 
Ever, ever ! " 

Then a piece of salted bread is given to the horse, and the owner 
spits seven times into his eyes, by which he is supposed to lose all 
fear for supernatural beings. According to the gypsies, horses, especi- 
ally black ones, can see beings which are invisible to human eyes. 
I have known an old English gypsy who believed that dogs could see 
ghosts when men could not. The mysterious manner in which dogs 
and horses betray fear when there is apparently nothing to dread, the 
howling of the former by night, and the wild rushes of the latter, 
doubtless led to this opinion. The bread and salt will recal to the 
reader the fact that the same was given at the ancient mysteries ap- 
parently for the purpose of strengthening the neophyte so: that he should 
not fear the supernatural beings whom he was supposed to meet. It is 
curious to find this peculiar form of the sacrament administered to a 
horse. Another protective charm is common among the Southern 
Hungarian gypsies. The dung of a she-goat dried and powdered is 
sifted on a horse's back and this spell recited : — 

" Miseces prejia, 
Andral t're pera ! 
Trada cik buscakri 
Miseces perakri, — 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 83 

Andral punra, andral dumno, 
Andral yakha, andral kanna ! 
Nevkeradyi av akana, 
Ac tu, ac tu ca mange : 
Ac tu, ac tu, ac kathe ! " 

" Evil be gone 
From thy belly ! 
Drive away she-goat's dung 
Evil from the belly, 
From the feet, from the back, 
From the eyes, from the ears ! 
New-born be now, 
Be thou, be thou only mine : 
Stay thou, stay thou, stay here ! " 

There is evidently a relation here between the dung of the she-goat 
and certain ancient symbols. Whatever was a sign of fruitfulness, 
generation, or productiveness, whether it was set forth by the generative 
organs, sexual passion, or even manure which fertilises, was connected 
with Life which is the good or vital principle opposed to death. As 
the goat was eminently a type of lechery, so the she-goat, owing to the 
great proportion of milk which she yielded, set forth abundance ; hence 
the cornucopia of Amalthea, the prototype of the she-goat Heidrun of 
the Northern mythology, who yielded every day so much milk that all 
the Einheriar, or dwellers in Valhall, could satisfy themselves therewith. 1 
But the forms or deities indicating life were also those which shielded and 
protected from evil, therefore Here, the mother of life and of birth, had 
in Sparta a shrine where she-goats were sacrificed to her, while at Canu- 
vium the statue of Juno Sospita (who was also Here), was covered with 
a she-goat's skin. It is in the ancient sense of fertility identified with 
protection, that the she-goat's dung is used to exorcise evil from the 

' "Geit suer Heidrun heitr stendr uppi a Valholl. ... En or spenum hcnnar rennr 
moilk. . . thaer ero sva miklar at allir einheria verda fuldrucknir af." (" A ewe named 
Heidrun stands up in Valhalla. And from her udders runs milk; there is so much that 
all the heroes may drink their fill of it "). (Snorro Sturleson's " Edda," 20th talc). 



84 GYPSY SORCERY. 

horse by the gypsies. There is, in fact, in all of these charms and 
exorcisms a great deal which evidently connects them with the earliest 
rites and religions. 

In the Hungarian gypsy-tribe of the Kukuya, the following method 
of protecting horses is used : The animal is placed by the tent-fire and 
there a little hole is dug before him into which ninefold grass and 
some hairs from his mane and tail are put. Then his left fore-hoof 
is traced on the ground, and the earth within it is carefully taken out 
and shaken into the hole, while these lines are repeated : — 

" Yeka cunul yeka bal, 
Tute e bolch nam sal, 
Ko tut corel, the merel 
Sar e bala, cunula, 
Pal e pcuv the yov avel ! 
Pcuvus, adalen tute, 
Sastes gray ac mange ! " 

"A straw, a hair ! 

May you never be hungry ! 
May he who steals you die ! 
Like the hair and the straw, 
May he go to the ground ! 
Earth, these things to thee ! 
May a sound horse be mine ! " 

If the animal be a mare and it is desired that she shall be with 
foal, they give her oats to eat out of an apron or a gourd, and say : — 

" Trin kanalya, trin jiukla, 
Jianen upre playa ! 
Caba, pcares hin pera ! 
Trin kanalya, trin jiukla 
Jianen tele playa, 
£ ceva andrasavaren 
Yek cumut andre casaren, 
Tre pera sik pcareven ! " 

" Three asses, three dogs, 
Go up the hill ! 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 85 

Eat, fill thy belly with young ! 

Three asses, three dogs, 

Go down the hill, 

They close the holes, 

They put the moon in (them) 

Thy belly be soon fruitful ! " 

" The moon has here," remarks Wlislocki, " a phallic meaning, 
the mention of the ass, and the use of the gourd and apron are symbols 
of fertility. Vide De Gubernatis, ' Animals in Indian Mythology/ 
in the chapter on the ass." 

There is another formula for protecting and aiding cattle, which 
is practised among other races besides that of the gypsies ; as, for 
instance, among the Slovacks of Northern Hungary. This I shall leave 
in the original : — 

"Dieser Verwahrungsmittel besteht darin, dass dem gekauften weiblichen "Thiere 
der Mann den blanken Hintern zeigt, einem m'annlichen Thiere aber eine weibliche 
Person. Hiebei werden die Worte gesagt : — 

" Sar o kar pal e punra, 
Kiya mange ac taysa ! 



Wie der Schwantz am Bein, 
Sollst du stets bei mir sein ! " 



Or else 



" Sar e mine pal e per, 
Kiya mange ac buter ! 

Wie das Loch im Leib, 
Also bei mir bleib ! " 

To secure swine to their owner a hole is dug in the turf which 
is filled with salt and charcoal dust, which is covered with earth, and 
these words uttered : — 

" Ada hin tute 
Na ava pal menge 
Dav tute, so kamav 
P5uvusheya, ashuna, 



86 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Cores tuna muka 
Hin menge trin lanca, 
Trin may lace Urma, 
Ke ferinen men ! " 

"This is thine, 
Come not to us ! 
I give thee what I can 
Oh Spirit of earth, hear ! 
Let not the thief go ! 
We have three chains, 
Three very good fairies 
Who protect us. " 

If the swine find the hole and root it up — as they will be tolerably- 
certain to do owing to their fondness for salt and charcoal — they will not 
be stolen or run away. 

The Urmen, or Fairies, are supposed to be very favourable to cattle, 
therefore children who torment cows are told " Urme tute nd bica somnakune 
pfdbdy" — "The fairies will not send you any golden apples!" If the 
English gypsies had the word Urme (and it may be that it exists among 
them even yet), this would be, " / Urme nd bitcher tute sonnakai pdbya ! " 

But the mighty charm of charms to protect cattle from theft is the 
following : Three drops of blood are made to fall from the finger of a 
little child on a piece of bread which is given to the animal to eat, with 
these words : — 

" Dav tute trinen rata 
Ternes te laces avna ! 
Ko tut corel, adaleske 
Hin rat te mas shutyardye ! 

Kana rata te rata 

Paltire per avna, 

Yakh te yakh te bare yakh 

Sikoves cal te cal 

Ko kamel tut te cal ! " 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 87 

"I give three (drops of) blood 
To become young and good ; 
Who steals thee to him 
Shall be (is) blood and flesh dried up ! 

When blood and blood 
Pass into thy belly, 
Fire and fire and great fire 
Shall devour and devour all 
Who will eat thee ! " 

This incantation takes us back to grim old heathenism with hints 
of human sacrifice. When the thief was suspected or privately detected 
it is probable that a dose of some burning poison made good the prediction. 
" The word young" remarks Dr. Wlislocki, " may be here understood to 
mean innocent^ since, according to ancient belief, there was a powerful magic 
virtue in the blood of virgins and of little children. Every new tent 
is therefore sprinkled by the gypsies with a few drops of a child's blood 
to protect it from magic or any other accident." So in prehistoric times, 
and through the Middle Ages, a human being was often walled up alive 
in the foundations of a castle to insure its durability. {Vide P. Cassel, 
"Die Symbolik des Blutes," p. 157.) 

When the wandering, or tent-gypsies, find that cattle are ill and do 
not know the nature of the disease, they take two birds — if possible 
quails, called by them hereto or fiiryo — one of which is killed, but the 
other, besprinkled with its blood, is allowed to fly away. With what 
remains of the blood they sprinkle some fodder, which is put before the 
animal, with the words : — 

" So andre tu misec hin 

Avri ava ! 
Kathe ker na. avla, 

Miseceske ! 
Kan a rata na avna, 
Nasvalyipen na avna ! 
Misec, tu avri ava, 
Ada ker na lace ; 
Dav rata me kathe ! " 



88 GYPSY SORCERl 

"What in thee is evil 

Come forth ! 
Here is no home 

For the evil one ! 
When (drops of) blood come not, 
Sickness comes not, 
Thou evil one, come forth ! 

" Trin parne, trin kale, 
Trin tcule pashlajen kathe, 
Ko len hadjinel 
Ac kiva mange ! " 

"Three white, three black, 
Three fat lie together here. 
Whoever disturbs them 
Remain to me ! (Be mine !) " 

To insure pigs thriving by a new owner, some charcoal-dust is mingled 
with their food and these words spoken : — 

" Nivaseske na muka, 
The cal t're cabena ! 
Misec yakha tut dikhen, 
The yon kathe mudaren, 
Tu atunci ciba len ! " 

"Do not let the Nivasi 
Eat thy food, 
Evil eyes see thee, 
And they here shall perish, 
Then do thou eat them ! 

As a particularly powerful conjuration against thieves, the owner 
runs thrice, while quite naked, round the animal or object which he wishes 
to protect£and repeats at every turn :— 

" Oh coreya na prejia. 
Dureder na ava ! 
T're vasta, t're punra 
Avena kirnodya 
Te ada peda laves ! " 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 89. 

" Oh, thief, do not go, 
Further do not come ! 
Thy hands, thy feet 
Shall decay 
If thou takest this animal ! '' 

Another " thieves' benediction " is as follows : The owner goes at 
midnight with the animal or object to be protected to a cross-roads, and 
while letting fall on the ground a few hairs of the beast, or a bit of the 
thing whatever it be, repeats : — 

"Ada hin tute, 
Na ava pal menge, 
Dav tute, so kamav ; 
Pcuvuseya ashuna ! " 

" This home is not good, 
Here I give (thee) blood ! " 

" The gypsies call the quail the devil's bird (Ciriclo bengeskro) v 
and ascribe diabolic properties to it. {Vide Cassel, 6 and 162.) The 
daughters of the Nivasi appear as quails in the fields by day, but during 
the night they steal the corn. To keep them away it is held good during 
sowing-time to place in each of the four corners of the field, parts of 
a quail, or at least some of the feathers of a black hen which has never 
laid an egg. This superstition is also current among the Roumanian 
peasants of the Siebenbiirgen." 

The primitive meaning of the myth may perhaps be found in the 
Greek tradition which regarded the quail, because it was a bird of 
passage, as a type of revival of spring or of life. Hercules awakes 
from his swoon when his companion Iolaus (from the Greek iov\os, 
youth), holds a quail to his nose. Hercules suffered from epilepsy, 
for which disease the ancients thought the brain of a quail was a specific. 
The placing pieces of a quail, by the gypsies, in the corners of a field 
when corn is sown, connects the bird with spring. Artemis, a goddess 
of spring and life, was called by the Romans Ortygyia, from oprv%, a 
quail. Therefore, as signifying new life, the quail became itself a cure 

J 3 



.go GYPSY SORCERY. 

for many diseases. And it seems to be like the Wren, also a bird of 

witchcraft and sorcery, or a kind of witch itself. It is a protector, 

because, owing to its pugnacity, it was a type of pluck, battle and 

victory. In Phoenicia it was sacrificed to Hercules, and the Romans 

were so fanatical in regard to it that Augustus punished a city-father 

for serving upon his table a quail which had become celebrated for its 

prowess. And so it has become a devil's bird among the gypsies because 

in the old time it was regarded as a devil of a bird for fighting. 

The gypsies are hardly to be regarded as Christians, but when they 

wish to contend against the powers of darkness they occasionally invoke 

Christian influences. If a cow gives bloody milk it is thought to be 

caused by her eating JVachtelkraut, or quail weed, which is a poison. 

In such a case they sprinkle the milk on a field frequented by quails 

and repeat : — 

"Dav rata tumenge 
Ada na hin lace ! 
Rayeskro Kristeskro rata 
Ada hin may lace 
Ada hin iimenge ! " 

" I give to you blood, 
Which is not good ! 
The Lord Christ's blood 
Is truly good, 
That is ours ! '' 

U a cow makes water while being milked, she is bewitched, and it 
is well in such a case to catch some of the urine, mix it with onion- 
peelings and the egg of a black hen. This is boiled and mixed with 
ihe cow's food while these lines are repeated : — 

" Ko andre hin, avriava, 
Trin Urma cingarden les, 
Trin Urma traden les 
Andre yandengre ker 
Beshel yov andre ker 
Hin leske may yakha, 
Hin leske may pafia ! " 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 91 

" Who is within, let him come out ! 
Three Urme call him, 
Three Urme drive him 
Into the egg-shell house, 
There he lives in the house ; 
He has much fire, 
He has much water ! " 

Then half the shell of the egg of the black hen is thrown into a 
running stream and the other half into a fire. 

Next to the Nivasi and Pcuvuse, or spirits of earth and air, and 
human sorcerers or witches, the being who is most dreaded as injuring 
cattle is the Chagrin or Cagrino. These demons have the form of a 
hedgehog, are of yellowish colour, and are half a yard in length, and a 
span in breadth. " I am certain," says Wlislocki, " that this creature 
is none other than the equally demoniac being called Harginn, still 
believed in by the inhabitants of North-western India. {Vide Liebrecht, 
p. 112, and Leitner, 'Results of a Tour in Dardistan Kashmir,' &C, 
vol. i. p. 13.) The exact identity of the description of the two, as well 
as that of the name, prove that the gypsies brought the belief from their 
Indian home." It may here be observed that the Indian name is 
Harginn, and the true gypsy word is pronounced very nearly like 
' Hdgrin — the being an arbitrary addition. The transposition of letters 
in a word is extremely common among the Hindu gypsies. The Chagrin 
specially torments horses, by sitting on their backs and making water 
on their bodies. The next day they appear to be weary, sad, sick, and 
weak, bathed in sweat, with their manes tangled. When this is seen 
the following ceremony is resorted to : The horse is tied to a stake which 
has been rubbed with garlic juice, then a red thread is laid in the form 
of a cross on the ground, but so far from the heels of the horse that 
he cannot disturb it. And while laying it down the performer sings : — 

"Save misec ac kathe, 
Ac andre lunge tave, 
Andre leg pashader paiii. 



. g2 GYPSY SORCERY. 

De tu tire pani 
Andre 9116a Charifieya, 
Andre tu sik mudara ! " 

"All evil stay here, 
Stay in the long thread, 
In the next brook (water). 
Give thy water, 
Jump in Chagrin ! 
Therein perish quickly ! " 

Of the widely-spread and ancient belief in the magic virtues of 
garlic and red wool I have elsewhere spoken. That witches and goblins 
or imps ride horses by night and then restore them in the morning to 
their stalls in a wretched condition — trembling, enfeebled, and with 
tangled manes — is believed all the world over, and it would probably be 
found that the Chagrin also gallops them. 

Another charm against this being consists of taking some of the 
hair of the animal, a little salt, and the blood of a bat, which is all 
mixed with meal and cooked to a bread. With this the foot of the 
horse is smeared, and then the empty pipkin is put into the trunk of 
a high tree while these words are uttered : — 

"Ac tu cin kathe, 
Cin ada tcutcs avid ! " 

" Stay so long here, 
Till it shall be full ! " 

The blood of the bat may be derived from an Oriental belief that 
the bat being the most perfect of birds, because it has breasts and suckles 
its young, it is specially adapted to magical uses. In the Tyrol he 
who bears the left eye of a bat may become invisible, and in Hesse he 
who wears the heart of a bat bound to his arm with red thread will 
always win at cards. The manes of the horses which have been tangled 
and twisted by the Chagrin must not be cut off or disentangled unless 
these words are spoken : — 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 93 

" Cin tu jid', cin ada ball jiden." 

"So long live thou, long as these hairs shall live." 

It is an European belief that knots of hair made by witches must 
not be disentangled. The belief that such knots are made intentionally 
by some intelligence is very natural. I have often been surprised to 
find how frequently knots form themselves in the cord of my eye-glass, 
even when pains are taken at night to lay it down so as to be free of 
them. Apropos of which I may mention that this teasing personality 
of the eye-glass and cord seems to have been noted by others. I was 
once travelling on the Nile in company with a Persian prince, who 
became convinced that his eye-glass was very unlucky, and therefore threw 
it into the river. 

The Chagrin specially torments mares which have recently foaled ; 
therefore it is held needful, soon after the birth, to put into the water 
which the mother drinks glowing hot coals, which are thrice taken from 
the fire. With these are included pieces of iron, such as nails, knives, &c, 
.and the following words are solemnly murmured : — 

" Piya tu te na ac sovnibnastar ! " 

"Drink, and do not be sleepy!" 

Many readers may here observe that charcoal and iron form a real 
tonic, or very practical strengthening dose for the enfeebled mare. But 
here, as in many cases medicine makes a cure and the devil or the 
doctor gets the credit. The Chagrin is supposed to attack horses only 
while they are asleep. Its urine often causes swellings or sores. These 
are covered by day with a patch of red cloth, which is stuck at night 
into a hole in a tree, which is closed with a cork, while these words 

are pronounced : — 

"Ac tu kathe 
Cin aula tav peda 
Cin peda yek ruk 
Cin ruk yek manush 
Ko mudarel tut." 



94 GYPSY SORCERY. 

"Remain thou here 
Till the rag become an animal, 
Till the animal, a tree, 
Till the tree, a man, 
Who will destroy thee ! " 

Dr. Wlislocki suggests that " the idea of the tree's becoming a 
man, is derived from the old gypsy belief that the first human beings 
were made from the leaves of trees, and refers to what he has else- 
where written on a tradition of the creation of the world, as held by 
Transylvanian gypsies. The following is a children's song, in which the 
belief may be traced : — 

"Amaro dad jal andro bes 
Cingerel odoy caves, 
Del dayakri andre pada 
Yek cavoro ada avla." 

" Our father went into a wood, 
There he cut a boy, 
Laid it in mother's bed, 
So a boy comes." 

The Greeks believed that man was made from an ash-tree, and 
the Norsemen probably derived it from the same source with them. 
In 1862 I published in The Continental Magazine (New York) a paper 
on the lore connected with the ash, in which effort was made to show 
that in early times in India the Banyan was specially worshipped,, 
and that the descendants of men familiar with this cult had, after 
migrating to the Far West, transferred the worship and traditions of the 
banyan to the ash. It has been observed that the ash-tree sometimes — 
like the banyan — sends its shoots down to the ground, where they take 
root. The Algonkin Indians seem to have taken this belief of man's 
origin from the ash from the Norsemen, as a very large proportion of 
their myths correspond closely to those of the Edda. But, in brief, if 
the Greeks and Norsemen were of Aryan origin, and had ever had. 
a language in common, they probably had common myths. 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 95 

The following is the remedy for the so-called Wurmer, or worms, 
i.e., external sores. Before sunrise wolf's milk (Wolfsmilch, rukeskro t$ud) 
is collected, mixed with salt, garlic, and water, put into a pot, ,and boiled 
down to a brew. With a part of this the afflicted spot is rubbed, the 
rest is thrown into a brook, with the words : — 

" Kirmora janen andre tcud 
Andral tcud, andre sir 
Andral sir, andre pani, 
Panensa kiya dadeske, 
Kiya Nivaseske 
Pcandel tumen sheleha 
EMvardesh tefia ! " 

" Worms go in the milk, 
From the milk into the garlic, 
From the garlic into the water, 
With the water to (your) father, 
To the Nivasi, 

He shall bind you with a rope, 
Ninety-nine (yards long). " 

A common cure of worms in swine among the Transylvanian tent- 
gypsies is to stand ere the sun rises before a fadcerli, or nettle, and while 
pouring on it the urine of the animal to be cured, repeat : — 

"Lace, lace detehara ! 
Hin mange may bute trasha 
Kirmora hin [baleceske], 
Te me penav, penav tute ! 
Kales hin yon, loles, parnes, 
Deisisla hin yon mulanes!" 

" Good, good morrow ! 
I have much sorrow. 
Worms are in [my swine to-day] 
And I say, to you I say, 
Black are they or white or red 
By to-morrow be they dead ! " 



9 6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

The nettle has its own peculiar associations. According to the 
gypsies it grows chiefly in places where there is a subterranean passage 
to the dwellings of the Pcuvus, or Earth-fairies, therefore it is consecrated 
to them and called Kdsta Pfuvasengrtf, Pcuvus-wood. Hence the gypsy- 
children while gathering nettles for pigs sing : — 

" Cadcerli na pcabuva. ! 
Andre leer me na jiav, 
Kiya Pcuvus na jiav, 
Traden, traden kirmora ! " 

"Nettle, nettle do not burn, 
In your house no one shall go, 
No one to the Pcuvus goes, 
Drive, drive away the worms ! " 

"The nettle," says Friedrich (" Symbolik der Natur," p. 324),. 
" because it causes a burning pain is among the Hindoos a demoniac 
symbol, for, as they say, the great serpent poured out its poison on it. 
But as evil is an antidote for evil, the nettle held in the hand is a guard 
against ghosts, and it is good for beer when laid upon the barrel."' 
" From its employment as an aphrodisiac, and its use in flagellation to 
restore sexual power, it is regarded as sacred to Nature by the fol- 
lowers of a secret sect or society still existing in several countries, 
especially Persia " (MS. account of certain Secret Societies). The gypsies 
believe that the Earth-fairies are the foes of every kind of worm and 
creeping insect with the exception of the snail, which they therefore call; 
the " gray Pcuvusengre," the Pcuvus-horse. Gry-puvusengree would in* 
English gypsy mean the earthy-horse. English gypsies, and the English' 
peasantry, as well as gypsies, call snails " cattle, because they have horns."" 
Snails are a type of voluptuousness, because they are hermaphrodite, and. 
exceedingly giving to sexual indulgence, so that as many as half a dozen 
may be found mutually giving and taking pleasure. Hence in German 
Schnecke, a snail, is a term applied to the -pudendum muliebre. And as 
anything significant of fertility, generation, and sexual enjoyment was sup- 
posed to constitute a charm or amulet against witchcraft, i.e., all evil 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 97 

influences, which are allied to sterility, chastity, and barrenness, a snail's 
shell forms a powerful fetish for a true believer. The reference to white, 
black, or red in the foregoing charm, or rather the one before it, refers, 
says Dr. Wlislocki, to the gypsy belief that there are white, black, 
and red Earth-fairies. A girl can win (illicit) love from a man by 
inducing him to carry a snail shell which she has had for some time 
about her person. To present a snail shell is to make a very direct but 
not very delicate declaration of love to any one. I have heard of a lady 
who caused an intense excitement in a village by collecting about a 
hundred large snails, gilding their shells, and then turning them loose in 
several gardens, where their discovery excited, as may be supposed, great 
excitement among the finders. 

If pigs lose their appetites a brew is made of milk, charcoal dust, 
and their own dung, which is put before them with the words : ' c Friss 
Hexe und verreck ! " 

" In this place 1 must remark that the Transylvanian tent-gypsies 
use for grumus merdoe also the expression Hirte (feris) " (Wlislocki). 
To cure a cough in animals one should take from the hoofs of the first 
riding horse, dirt or dust, and put it into the mouth of the suffering 
animal with the words : — 

"Prejial te nani yov avel ! " 
" May he go away and never return ! " 

To have a horse always in good spirits and lively during the 
waning moon his spine is rubbed with garlic, while these words are 

uttered : — 

" Misec andre tut, 
O beng the 9a! but ! 
Laces andre' tut 
Acel andre tut ! " 

" (What is) evil in thee, 
May the devil eat it much ! 
(What is) good in thee, 
May it remain in thee ! " 

14 



9 8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

But it is far more effective when the garlic is put on a rag of the 
clothes of one who has been hanged, and the place rubbed with it : in 
which we have a remnant of the earliest witchcraft, before Shamanism, 
which had recourse to the vilest and most vulgar methods of exciting awe 
and belief. This is in all probability the earliest form in which magic, 
or the power of controlling invisible or supernatural influences manifested 
itself, and it is very interesting to observe that it still survives, and that 
the world still presents every phase of its faiths, ab initio. 

There is a very curious belief or principle attached to the use of 
songs in conjuring witches, or in averting their own sorcery. It is that 
the witch is obliged, willy nilly, to listen to the end to what is in metre, 
an idea founded on the attraction of melody, which is much stronger 
among savages and children than with civilized adults. Nearly allied to 
this is the belief that if the witch sees interlaced or bewildering and 
confused patterns she must follow them out, and by means of this her 
thoughts are diverted or scattered. Hence the serpentine inscriptions of 
the Norsemen and their intertwining bands which were firmly believed to 
bring good luck or avert evil influence. A traveller in Persia states that 
the patterns of the carpets of that country are made as bewildering as 
possible " to avert the evil eye." And it is with this purpose that in 
Italian, as in all other witchcraft, so many spells and charms depend 
on interwoven braided cords. 

'.' Twist ye, twine ye, even so, 
Mingle threads of joy and woe." 

The basis for this belief is the fascination, or instinct, which many 
persons, especially children, feel to trace out patterns, to thread the mazes 
of labryinths or to analyze and disentangle knots and " cat's cradles." Did 
space permit, nor inclination fail, I could point out some curious proofs 
that the old belief in the power of long and curling hair to fascinate was 
derived not only from its beauty but also because of the magic of its 
curves and entanglements. 

The gypsies believe that the Earth-spirits are specially interested in 



CHARMS OR CONJURATIONS TO CURE OR PROTECT ANIMALS. 99 

animals. They also teach women the secrets of medicine and sorcery. 
There are indications of this in the negro magic. Miss Mary Owen, an 
accomplished Folk-lorist of St. Joseph, Missouri, who has been deeply 
instructed in Voodooism, informs me that a woman to become a witch 
must go by night into a field and pull up a weed by the roots. From 
the quantity of soil which clings to it, is inferred the degree of magic 
power which the pupil will attain. I am not astonished to learn that 
when this lady was initiated, the amount of earth collected was 
unusually great. In such cases the Pchuvus (or Poovus in English gypsy), 
indicate their good-will by bestowing " earth," which, from meaning luck 
or good-fortune, has passed in popular parlance to signifying money. 

LOFC 




rj'jw 



CHAPTER VI. 



OF PREGNANCY AND CHARMS, OR FOLK-LORE CONNECTED WITH IT 

boars' TEETH AND CHARMS FOR PREVENTING THE FLOW OF BLOOD. 

i^ IKE all Orientals the gypsy desires 
i\('\ intensely to have a family. Super- 
stition comes in to increase 
the wish, for a barren 
woman in Eastern Europe 
is generally suspected of 
having had intercourse with 
a vampire or spirit before 
her marriage, and she who 
has done this, willingly or 
unconsciously, never has 
children. They have re- 
course to many magic 
medicines or means to pro- 
mote conception ; one of 
the most harmless in 
Hungary is to eat grass from the grave in which a woman with child 
has been buried. While doing this the woman repeats : — 

" Dui rika hin mire mine, 
Dui yara hin leskro kor, 
Avnas dui yek jelo, 
Keren akana yek jeles." 




PREGNANCY AND CHARMS. 101 

Or else the woman drinks the water in which the husband has cast 
hot coals, or, better still, has spit, saying : — 

" Kay me yakh som 
Ac tu angar, 
Kay me brishind som, 
Ac tu pani ! " 

" Where I am flame 
Be thou the coals ! 
Where I am rain 
Be thou the water ! " 

Or at times the husband takes an egg, makes a small hole at each 
end, and then blows the yolk and white into the mouth of his wife who 
swallows them. 

There are innumerable ways and means to ensure pregnancy, some 
of which are very dangerous. Faith in the so-called " artificial propaga- 
tion " is extensively spread. " Will der zigeuner einen Sohn erzielen, so 
giirtet er sich mit dem Halfterzaume eines mannlichen Pferdes und timge- 
kehrt mit dem einer Stute, will er eine Tochter erzeugen." (" Gebrauche 
d. Trans. Zig." Dr. H. von Wlislocki. " 111. Zeitschrift. Band," 51. 
No. 16.) 

If a gypsy woman in Transylvania wishes to know whether she be 
with child, she must stand for nine evenings at a cross-road with an axe 
or hammer, which she must wet with her own water, and then bury 
there. Should it be dug up on the ninth morning after, and found rusty, 
it is a sign that she is " in blessed circumstances." 

To bring on the menses a gypsy woman must, while roses are in 
bloom, wash herself all over with rose-water, and then pour the water 
over a rose-bush. Or she takes an egg, pours its contents into a jug, 
and makes water on it. If the egg swims the next morning on the 
surface she is enceinte ; if the yolk is separate from the white she will 
bear a son, if they are mingled a daughter. In Tuscany women 
wishing for children go to a priest, get a blessed apple and pronounce 
over it an incantation to Santa Anna, which was probably addressed in 



I02 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Roman days to Lucina, who was very probably, according to the Romagna- 
dialect, lu S' anna— -Santa Anna herself. I have several old Roman spells 
from Marcellus, which still exist word for word in Italian, but fitted 
to modern usage in this manner like old windows to new houses. 

Should a woman eat fish while pregnant the child will be slow in 
learning to speak, but if she feed on snails it will be slow in learning 
to walk. The proverbs, " Dumb as a fish," and " Slow as a snail," appear 
here. 

To protect a child against the evil eye it is hung with amulets, 
generally with shells {die eine Aehnlkhkeit mit der weiblichen Scham 
haben). And these must be observed on all occasions, and for every- 
thing, ceremonies, of which there are literally hundreds, showing that 
gypsies, notwithstanding their supposed freedom from conventionalisms,, 
are, like all superstitious people, harassed and vexed to a degree which 
would seem incredible to educated Europeans, with observances and rites 
of the most ridiculous and vexatious nature. The shells alluded to are,, 
however, of great interest, as they indicate the transmission of the old 
belief that symbols typical of generation, pleasure, and reproductiveness, 
are repugnant to witchcraft which is allied to barrenness, destruction, 
negation, and every kind of pain and sterility. 

Hence a necklace of shells, especially cowries or snail shells, or the 
brilliant and pretty conchiglie found in such abundance near Venice, are 
regarded as protecting animals or children from the evil eye, and facili- 
tating love, luxury, and productiveness. I have read an article in which 
a learned writer rejects with indignation the " prurient idea " that the 
cowrie, which gave its name porcellana to porcelain, derived it from 
porcella, in sensu obsceno ; porcella being a Roman word not only for pig 
but for the female organ. But every donkey-boy in Cairo could have 
told him that the cowrie is used in strings on asses as on children 
because the shell has the likeness which the writer to whom I refer 
rejects with indignation. The pig, as is well known, is a common amulet, 
the origin thereof being that it is extremely prolific. It has within a few 



PREGNANCY AND CHARMS. 



103 



•years been very much revived in silver as a charm for ladies, and may 
be found in most shops where ornaments for watch-chains are sold. The 
boar's tooth, as I have before mentioned, has been since time immemorial 
a charm ; I have found them attached to chatelaines and bunches of keys, 
especially in Austria, from one to four or [five centuries past. They are 
found in prehistoric graves. The tusk is 
properly a male emblem ; a pig is some- 
times placed on the base. These are stil 
very commonly made and sold. I 
one worn by the son of a travelling 
basket-maker, who spoke Romany, and I 
purchased several in Vienna (1888), also 
in Copenhagen in 1889. In , - - 
Florence very large boars' tusks 
are set as brooches, and may be 
found generally in the smaller 
jewellers' shops and on the Ponte 
Vecchio. They are regarded as 
protective against malocchio — a 
general term for evil influences — 
especially for women during preg- 
nancy, and as securing plenty, i.e. 
perity and increase, be it of worldly goods, 
honour, or prosperity. There is in the 
museum at Budapest a boar's tusk, 
mounted or set as an amulet, which is 
apparently of Celtic origin, and which certainly belongs to the migration 
of races, or a very early period. And it is in this eastern portion of 
Europe that it is still most generally worn as a charm. 

In connection with pregnancy and childbirth there is the profluvium 
excessive flow of blood, or menses or hemorrhages, for which there 
exist many charms, not only among gypsies but all races. This includes 




W 



BOAR S TOOTH. VIENNA. 



io4 GYPSY SORCERY. 

the stopping any bleeding — an art in which Scott's Lady of Deloraine 
was an- expert, and which many practised within a century. 

" Tom Potts was but a serving man, 
And yet he was a doctor good, 
He bound a handkerchief on the wound. 

And with some kind of words he staunched the blood." 

What these same kind of words were among old Germans and 

Romans may be learned from the following: Jacob Grimm had long 

been familiar with a German magic spell of the eleventh century — ad 

stringendum sanguinem, or stopping bleeding — but, as he says, " noch nicht 

zu deuten vermochte," could not explain them. They were as follows : — 

" Tumbo saz in berke, 
Mit tumbemo kinde in arme, 
Tumb hiez der berc 
Tumb hiez daz kint, 
Der heiligo Tumbo 
Versegne dise wunta." 

"Tumbo {i.e., dumm or stupid) sat in the hill 
With a stupid child in arms, 
Dumb (stupid) the hill was called 
Dumb was called the child, 
The holy Tumbo (or dumb). 
Heal (bless) this wound ! " 

Some years after he found the following among the magic formulas 
of Marcellus Burdigalensis : — 

" Carmen utile profluvio mulieri : — 

" Stupidus in monte ibat, 

Stupidus stupuit, 

Adjuro te matrix 

Ne hoc iracunda suscipias. 
" Pari ratione scriptum ligabis. : ' 

I.e. : " A song useful for a flow of blood in woman : — 

" The stupid man went into the mountain, 
The stupid man was amazed ; 
I adjure thee, oh womb, 
Be not angry ! 



PREGNANCY AND CHARMS. 105 

" Which shall also be bound as a writing," i.e., according to a previous 
direction that it shall be written on virgin parchment, and bound with 
a linen cord about the waist of him or of her — qua patietur de qualibet 
parte corporis sanguinis fluxum — who suffers anywhere from flow of 
blood. 

It is possible that the Stupidus and his blessing of women has here 
some remotely derived reference to the reverence amounting to worship 
of idiots in the East, who are described as being surrounded in some 
parts of India by matrons seeking for their touch and benediction, and 
soliciting their embraces. This is effected very often in an almost public 
manner ; that is to say, by a crowd of women closely surrounding the 
couple, i.e., the idiot or lunatic and one of their number are joined, so 
that passers-by cannot see what is going on. The children born of 
these casual matches are not unusually themselves of weak mind, but are 
considered all the more holy. This recalls the allusion in the charm : — 

" Stupid sat in the hill 
With a stupid child in arms." 

This obscure myth of the stupid god appears to be very ancient. 

" This Tritas is called intelligent. How then does he appear sometimes stupid ? 
The language itself supplies the explanation. In Sanskrit bdlas means both child and 
stolid, and the third brother is supposed to be stolid because, at his first appearance 
especially, he is a child. (Tritas is one of the three brothers or gods, i.e., the trinity)." 
("Zoological Mythology," by Angelo de Gubernatis, 1872). 

I am indebted to the as yet unpublished collection of Gypsyana 
made by Prof. Anton Herrmann for the following : — 

There is a superstition among our gypsies that if the shadow of 
a cross on a grave falls on a woman with child she will have a mis- 
carriage, and this seems to be peculiarly appropriate to girls who have 
" anticipated the privileges of matrimony." The following rhyme seems 
to describe the hesitation of a girl who has gone to a cross to produce 

15 



Io6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

the result alluded to, but who is withheld by love for her unborn 

infant : — 

" Cigno trusul pal handako 

Hin ada usalinako ; 

The ziav me pro usalin, 

Ajt' mange lasavo na kin. 

Sar e praytin kad' chasarel, 
Save sile barval marel, 
Pal basavo te prasape, 

Mre cajori mojd kamale." 

" Cross upon a grave so small 
Here I see thy shadow fall, 
If it fall on me they say 
All my shame will pass away. 

As the autumn leaf is blown, 
By the wind to die alone, 
Yet in shame and misery, 
My baby will be dear to me ! " 

There is a belief allied to this of the power of the dead in graves 

to work wonders, to the effect that if any one plucks a rose from a 

grave, he or she will soon die. In the following song a gypsy picks a 

rose from the grave of the one he loved, hoping that it will cause his 

death : — 

" Cignoro hrobosa 
Hin sukares rosa 
Mange la pchagavas, 
Doi me na kamavas. 

Bes'las piranake, 
Hrobas hin joy mange, 
Pchgavas, choc zanav 
Pal lele avava 
Te me ne brinzinav. 
The me pocivinav." 

" On her little tomb there grows 
By itself a lovely rose, 
All alone the rose I break, 
And I do it for her sake. 



PREGNANCY AND CHARMS. 



107 



I sat by her I held so dear, 
Now her grave and mine are near, 
I break the rose because I know 
That to her I soon must go, 
Grief cannot my spirit stir, 
Since I know I go to her ! " 

M. Kounavine (contribution by Dr. A. Elysseeff, Gypsy-Lore 
Journal, July, 1890), gives the following as a Russian gypsy spell against 
barrenness : — 

" Laki, thou destroyest and dost make everything on earth ; thou canst see nothing 
■old, for death lives in thee, thou givest birth to all upon the earth for thou thyself 

art life. By thy might cause me to bear good fruit, I who am deprived of the 

joy of motherhood, and barren as a rock." 

According to Dr. Elysseeff, Laki is related to the Indian goddess 
Lakshmi, although differing from her in character. Another incantation 
•of the same nature is as follows : — 

" Thou art the mother of every living creature and the distributor of good : 
thou doest according to thy wisdom in destroying what is useless or what has lived its 
■destined time ; by thy wisdom thou makest the earth to regenerate all that is new. . . . 
Thou dost not seek the death of any one, for thou art the benefactress of mankind." 




%1 ■ 



CHAPTER VII. 



THE RECOVERY OF STOLEN PROPERTY LOVE-CHARMS SHOES AND 

LOVE-POTIONS, OR PHILTRES. 




THE RECOVERY OF STOLEN PROPERTY. 109 

enable the magician to surmise the truth. Many people place absolute con- 
fidence in their servants, and perhaps suspect nobody. The detective or 
gypsy has no such faith in man, and suspects everybody. Where positive 
knowledge cannot be established there is, however, another resource. The 
thief is often as superstitious as his victim. Hence he fears that some 
mysterious curse may be laid on him, which he cannot escape. In the 
Pacific Islands, as among negroes everywhere, a man will die if taboo 
or voodoo attaches to the taking of objects which have been consecrated 
by a certain formula. Therefore such formulas are commonly employed. 
Among the Hungarian gypsies to recover a stolen animal, some of its 
dung is taken and thrown to the East and the West with the words : — 

" Kay tut o kam dikhel : 
Odoy ava kiya. mange ! " 

"Where the sun sees thee, 
Hence return to me ! " 

But when a horse has been stolen, they take what is left of his 
harness, bury it in the earth and make a fire over it, saying : — 

" K6 tut cordyas 
Nasvales th' avlas 
Leske sor na avlas, 
Tu na ac kiya leske 
Ava sastes kiya mange ! 
Leskro sor kathe pashlyol 
Sar e tcuv avriural ! " 

"Who stole thee 
Sick may he be 
May his strength depart ! 
Do not thou remain by him, 
Come (back) sound to me, 
His strength lies here 
As the smoke goes away ! " 

To know in which direction the stolen thing lies, they carry a 
sucking babe to a stream, hold it over the water and say : — - 



no GYPSY SORCERY. 

" Pen mange, oh Nivaseya 
Caveskro vasteha 
Kay hin m'ro gray, 
Ujes hin cavo, 
Ujes sar o kam 
Ujes sar pani 
Ujes sar cumut 
Ujes sar legujes ? 
Pen mange, oh Nivaseya, 
Caveskro vasteha 
Kay hin m'ro gray ! " 

" Tell me, oh Nivaseha, 
By the child's hand ! 
Where is my horse ? 
Pure is the child 
Pure as the sun, 
Pure as water, 
Pure as the moon, 
Pure as the purest. 
Tell me, oh Nivaseha, 
By the child's hand ! 
Where is my horse ? " 

In this we have an illustration of the widely spread belief that an 
innocent child is a powerful agent in prophecy and sorcery. The oath 
" by the hand " is still in vogue among all gypsies. "Apo miro dadeskro 
vast!" ("By my father's hand!") is one of their greatest oaths in 
Germany, (" Die Zigeuner," von Richard Liebich), and I have 
met with an old gypsy in England who knew it. 

If a man who is seeking for stolen goods finds willow twigs grown 
into a knot, he ties it up and says : — 

" Me avri pcandav coreskro bacht ! " 
" I tie up the thief's luck ! " 

There is also a belief among the gypsies that these knots are twined 
by the fairies, and that whoever undoes them undoes his own luck, or 



L O VE- CHARMS. 1 1 1 

that of the person on whom he is thinking. {Vide Rocholz, " Ale- 
mannisches Kinderlied und Kinderspiel aus der Schweiz," p. 146). These 
willow-knots are much used in love-charms. To win the love of a 
maid, a man cuts one of them, puts it into his mouth, and says : — 

" T're bact me cav, 
T're ba£t me piyav, 
Dav tute m're bact, 
Kana tu mange sal." 

" I eat thy luck, 
I drink thy luck ; 
Give me that luck of thine, 
Then thou shalt be mine." 

Then the lover, if he can, secretly hides this knot in the bed of the 
wished-for bride. It is worth noting that these lines are so much like 
English Gypsy as it was once spoken that there are still men who would, 
in England, understand every word of it. Somewhat allied to this is 
another charm. The lover takes a blade of grass in his mouth, and 
turning to the East and the West, says : — 

"Kay o kam, avriavel, 
Kiya mange lele beshel ! 
Kay o kam tel' avel, 
Kiya lelakri me beshav." 

" Where the sun goes up 
Shall my love be by me ! 
Where the sun goes down 
There by her I'll be." 

Then the blade of grass is cut up into pieces and mingled with some 
food which the girl must eat, and if she swallow the least bit of the 
grass, she will be gewogen und treugesinnt — moved to love, and true- 
hearted. On which Dr. Wlislocki remarks on the old custom "also 
known to the Hindoos," by which any one wishing to deprecate the 
wrath of another, or to express complete subjection, takes a blade of 



ii2 GYPSY SORCERY. 

grass in his mouth. Of which Grimm writes : " This custom may have 
sprung from the idea that the one conquered gave himself up like a 
domestic animal to the absolute power of another. And with this appears 
to be connected the ancient custom of holding out grass as a sign of 
surrender. The conquered man took the blade of grass in his mouth 
and then transferred it to his conqueror." 

If a gypsy girl be in love she finds the foot-print of her " object," 
digs out the earth which is within its outline and buries this under a 
willow-tree, saying : — 

" Upro pcuv hin but pcuva ; 
Kas kamav, mange th' avla ! 
Barvol, barvol, salciye, 
Briga na hin mange ! 
Yov tover, me pori, 
Yov kokosh, me catra, 
Ada, ada me kamav !" 

" Many earths on earth there be, 
Whom I love my own shall be, 
Grow, grow willow tree ! 
Sorrow none unto me ! 
He the axe, I the helve, 
He the cock, I the hen, 
This, this (be as) I will ! " 

Another love-charm which belongs to ancient black witchcraft, and 
is known far and wide, is the following : When dogs are coupling 
{Wenn Hund und Hundin bei der Paarung zusammenhangen) the lover 
suddenly covers them with a cloth, if possible, one which is afterwards 
presented to the girl whom he seeks, while he says : — 

"Me jiuklo, yoy jiukli, 
Yoy tover, me pori, 
Me kokosh, yoy catra, 
Ada, ada . me kamav!'' 



L O VE- CHARMS. 1 1 5. 

'• I the dog, she the bitch, 
I the helve, she the axe, 
I the cock (and) she the hen, 
That, that I desire." 

He or she who finds a red ribbon, tape, or even a piece of red stuff" 
of any kind, especially if it be wool, will have luck in love. It must 
be picked up and carried as an amulet, and when raising it from the 
ground the finder must make a wish for the love of some person, or if 
he have no particular desire for any one, he may wish for luck in love, 
or a sweetheart. This is, I believe, pretty generally known in some 
form all over the world. A yellow ribbon or flower, especially if it be 
floating on water, presages gold ; a white object, silver, or peace or recon- 
ciliation with enemies. 

It is also lucky for love to find a key. In Tuscany there is a special 
formula which must be spoken while picking it up. Very old keys are 
valuable amulets. Those who carry them will learn secrets, penetrate 
mysteries, and succeed in what they undertake. 

If you can get a shoe which a girl has worn you may make sad havoc 
with her heart if you carry it near your own. Also hang it up over 
your bed and put into it the leaves of rue. 

During November, 1889, not a few newspaper commentators busied 
themselves with conjectures as to why a Scotch constable buried the boots 
of a murdered man. That it was done through some superstitious belief 
is conceded ; but what the fashion of the superstition is seems unknown. 
It originated, beyond question, in the old Norse custom of always burying 
the dead in their shoes or with them. For they believed that the 
deceased would have, when he arrived in the other world, to traverse 
broad and burning plains before he could reach his destination, be it 
Valhalla or the dreary home of Hel ; and to protect his feet from the 
fire his friends bound on them the " hell-shoon." Other cares were also 
taken : and in the saga of Olof Tryggvasen we are told that one monarch 
was thoughtfully provided with a cow ; while the Vikings were buried 



ii 4 GYPSY SORCERY. 

in their ships, so that they could keep on pirating " for ever and 
•ever." 

The superstition of the burial of the boots probably survives in 
England. It is about seventeen years since the writer heard from an old 
gypsy that when another gypsy was " puvado," or " earthed," a very 
good pair of boots was placed by him in the grave. The reason was 
not given ; perhaps it was not known. These customs often survive after 
the cause is forgotten, simply from some feeling that good or bad luck 
attends their observance or the neglect of it. Many years since a writer 
in an article on shoes in The English Magazine stated that, " according 
to an Aryan tradition, the greater part of the way from the land of the 
living to that of death lay through morasses and vast moors overgrown 
with furzes and thorns. That the dead might not pass over them bare- 
foot, a pair of shoes was laid with them in the grave." 

The shoe was of old in many countries a symbol of life, liberty, or 
entire personal control. In Ruth we are told that " it was the custom in 
Israel concerning changing, that a man plucked off his shoe and delivered 
it to his neighbour." So the bride, who was originally always a slave, 
transferred herself by the symbol of the shoe. When the Emperor 
Waldimir made proposals of marriage to the daughter of Ragnald, she 
replied scornfully that she would not take off her shoes to the son of a 
slave. Gregory of Tours, in speaking of wedding, says : " The bride- 
groom, having given a ring to the bride, presents her with a shoe." 

As regards the Scandinavian hel-shoe, or hell-shoon, Kelley, in his 
" Indo-European Folk-lore," tells us that a funeral is still called a dead 
shoe in the Henneberg district ; and the writer already cited adds that in 
a MS. of the Cotton Library, containing an account of Cleveland in 
Yorkshire, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, there is a passage which 
illustrates this curious custom. It was quoted by Sir Walter Scott in the 
notes to " Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border," and runs thus : — 

"When any dieth certaine women sing a song to the dead bodie, reciting the 
journey that the partye deceased must goe ; and they are of beliefe that once in their 



SHOES AND LOVE-POTIONS, OR PHILTRES. ix$ 

lives it is goode to give a pair of new shoes to a poor man ; forasmuch as before this- 
life they are to pass bare-foote through a great lande, full of thornes and furzen — excepte 
by the meryte of the almes aforesaid they have redeemed the forfeyte — for at the edge 
of the launde an oulde man shall meet them with the same shoes that were given by 
the partie when he was lyving, and after he hath shodde them dismisseth them to go' 
through thick and thin without scratch or scalle. 



This must be a very agreeable reflection to all gentlemen who have 
bestowed their old boots on waiters, or ladies who have in like fashion 
gifted their maids. It is true, the legend specifies new shoes ; but 
surely a pair of thirty-shilling boots only half worn count for as much 
as a new pair of half a sovereign chaussures. However, if one is to go 
" through thick and thin without scratch or scalle," it may be just as- 
well to be on the safe side, and give a good new extra stout pair to the 
gardener for Christmas. For truly these superstitions are strange things, 
and no one knows what may be in them. 

There are one or two quaint shoe stories of the olden time which 
may be of value to the collector. It befell once in the beginnings of 
Bohemia, that, according to Schafarik (" Slawische Alterthiimer," vol. ii, 
p. 422), L'ibussa, queen of that land, found herself compelled by her 
council to wed. And the wise men, being consulted, declared that he 
who was to marry the queen would be found by her favourite horse, 
who would lead the way till he found a man eating from an iron table, 
and kneel to him. So the horse went on, and unto a field where a man 
sat eating a peasant's dinner from a ploughshare. This was the farmer 
Prschemischl. So they covered him with the royal robes and led him to 
the queen expectant. But ere going he took his shoes of willow-wood 
and placed them in his bosom and kept them to remind him ever after 
of his low origin. It will, of course, at once strike the reader, as it has 
the learned, that this is a story which would naturally originate in any 
country where there are iron ploughshares, horses, queens, and wooden 
shoes : and, as Schafarik shrewdly suggests, that it was all " a put-up 
job ; " since, of course, Prschemischl was already a lover of the queen, 



n6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

the horse was trained to find him and to kneel before him, and, finally, 
that the ploughshare and wooden shoes were the prepared properties of 
the little drama. The only little flaw in this evidence is the name 
Prschemischl, which, it must be admitted, is extremely difficult to get 
over. 

The Seven League Boots and the shoes of Peter Schlemihl, which 
take one over the world at will, have a variation in a pair recorded in 
another tale. There was a beautiful and extremely proud damsel, who 
refused a young man with every conceivable aggravation of the offence, 
informing him that when she ran after him, and not before that, he 
might hope to marry her; and at the same time meeting a poor old. 
gypsy woman who begged her for a pair of old shoes. To which the 
proud Princess replied : — 

" Shoes here, shoes there ; 
Give me a couple, I'll give thee a pair." 

To which the old gypsy, who was a witch, grimly muttered, " I'll give 

thee a pair which " The rest of the expression was really too un- 

amiable to repeat. Well, the youth and the witch met, and, going to 
the lady's shoemaker, " made him make " a superbly elegant pair of 
shoes, which were sent to the damsel as a gift. Such a gift ! No sooner 
were they put on than off they started, carrying the Princess, malgre elk, 
over hill and dale. By and by she saw that a man — the man, of course, 
whom she had refused — was in advance of her. As in the song of the 
Cork Leg, " the shoes never stopped, but kept on the pace." And the 
young man led her to a lonely castle and reasoned with her. And as 
she had promised to marry should she ever run after him, and as she 
had pursued him a whole day, she kept her word. The shoes she sent 
to the witch filled with gold ; and they were wedded, and all went as 
merry as a thousand grigs in a duck-pond. 

The shoe, as has been shown by a Danish writer in a book chiefly 
devoted to the subject, is a type of life, especially as shown in produc- 



SHOES AND LOVE-POTIONS, OR PHILTRES. 117 

tiveness and fertility. Hence old shoes and grain are thrown after a 
bride, as people say, for luck ; but the Jews do it crying, " Peru urphu " — 
*' Increase and multiply." For this, and much more, the reader may con- 
sult that wonderful treasury of Folk-lore, " Die Symbolik und Mythologie 
der Natur," J. B. Friedrich, Wiirzburg, 1859. To which we would 
add our mite by remarking as a curious confirmation of this theory, that — 

There was an old woman who lived in a shoe, 

Who had so many children she didn't know what to do. 

This passes now for a mere nursery-rhyme ; but doubtless there are 
those who will trace it back to the early morning of mythology, and 
prove that it was once a Himaritic hymn, sung to some Melitta who 
has long passed away down the back entry of time. 

For several additional Hungarian gypsy love-charms and spells, 
collected by Dr. Wlislocki, published in Ethnographia, and subsequently 
in The Gipsy-Lore Journal for June, 1890, I am greatly indebted to the 
kindness of Mr. D. MacRitchie : — 

"The gypsy girls of Transylvania believe that spells to 'know your future husband' 
can be best carried out on the eves of certain days, such as New Year, Easter, and 
Saint George. ' On New Year's Eve they throw shoes or boots on a willow tree, but 
are only allowed to throw them nine times.' Compare this with the throwing of the 
old shoe after the bride in many countries. ' If the shoe catches in the branches the 
girl who threw it will be married within a year.' 

" On the same eve they go to a tree and shake it by turns, singing : — 

" ' Per de, per de prajtina, 
Varekaj hin, hasz kamav ? 
Basa, parro dzsiuklo, 
Pirano dzsal mai szigo.' 

" ' Scattered leaves around I see, 
Where can my true lover be ? 
Ah, the white dog barks at last ! 
And my love comes running fast ! ' 

"If during the singing the bark of a dog should be heard, the damsel will be 
'wedded and bedded and a'' ere New Year comes again. This is virtually the same 



„8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

with a charm practised in Tuscany, which from other ancient witness I believe to be 
of Etruscan origin. Allied to this is the following : On the night of Saint George's Day 
{query, Saint George's Eve ?) gypsy girls blindfold a white dog, then, letting it loose, 
place themselves quietly in several places. She to whom the dog runs first will be the 
first married. Blindman's buff was anciently an amorous, semi-magical, or witches' 
game, only that in place of the dog a man was blindfolded. 

" ' Or the girl pulls a hair from her head, fastens a ring to it, and dangles it in a 
jug. The ring vibrates or swings, and so often as it touches the side of the jug so many 
years will it be before she marries.' This is an ancient spell of Eastern origin. As 
performed according to old works the thread must be wound around the ring-finger 
and touch the pulse. On the edge of a bowl the letters of the alphabet, or numerals, 
are marked, and the ring swinging against these spells words or denotes numbers. The 
touching of the latter indicates the number of lovers a girl is to have. 

"Early on Whitsunday morning the girls go out, and if they see clouds in the 
East they throw twigs in that direction, saying : — 

" ' Predzsia, csirik leja, 

Te na trada m're piranes.' 

"'Fly my bird — fly, I say, 
Do not chase my love away.' 

" For they think that if on Whitsun-morn there are many clouds in the East few girls 
will be married during the coming year. This peculiar, seemingly incomprehensible, 
custom of the gypsies originated in an old belief, the germ of which we find in the 
Hindoo myth, according to which the spring morning which spreads brightness and 
blessings descends from the blue bird of heaven, who, on the other hand, also repre- 
sents night or winter. Special preparations are made so that the predictions shall be 
fulfilled. On the days mentioned the girls are neither allowed to wash themselves, nor 
to kiss any one, nor go to church. At Easter, or on the Eve of Saint George, the girl 
must eat fish, in order to see the future in her dreams. 

" On Easter morning the girls boil water, in the bubbles of which they try to make 
out the names of their future husbands. 

"To find out whether the future husband is young or old the girl must take nine 
seeds of the thorn-apple, ploughed-up earth of nine different places, and water from as 
many more. With these she kneads a cake, which is laid on a cross-road on Easter or 
Saint George's morning. If a woman steps first on the cake her husband will be a 
widower or an old man, but if a man the husband will be single or young. 

" To see the form of a future husband a girl must go on the night of Saint George 
to a cross-road. Her hair is combed backwards, and, pricking the little finger of the 
left hand, she must let three drops of blood fall on the ground while saying : — 



SHOES AND LOVE-POTIONS, OR PHILTRES. 119 

" ' Mro rat dav piraneszke, 
Kasz dikhav, avava adaleske.' 

" ' I give my blood to my loved one, 

Whom I shall see shall be mine own ! ' 

"Then the form of her future husband will rise slowly out of the blood and fade as 
slowly away. She must then gather up the dust, or mud-blood, and throw it into a 
river, otherwise the Nivashi, or Water-spirits, will lick up the blood, and the girl be 
■drowned within the year. It is said that about twenty years ago the beautiful Roszi 
(Rosa), the daughter of Peter Danku, the waywode, or chief of the Kukuja tribe, was 
drowned during the time of her betrothal because when she performed this ceremony 
she had neglected to gather up the sprinkled blood. 

"If a girl wishes to see the form of her future husband, and also to know what 
luck awaits her love, she goes on any of the fore-named nights to a cross-road, and sits 
down on the ground, putting before her a fried fish and a glass of brandy. Then the 
form of her future husband will appear and stand before her for a time, silent and 
immovable. 1 Should he then take the fish the marriage will be happy, [but if he begin 
with the brandy it will be truly wretched. But if he takes neither, one of the two 
will die during the year. 

" That the laying of cards, the interpretation of dreams, the reading of the 
future in the hand, and similar divinations are constantly practised is quite natural, 
but it would lead us too far to enlarge on all these practices. But there are charms 
to win or cause love which are more interesting. Among these are the love-potions 
■or philtres, for preparing which gypsies have always been famed. 

" The simplest and least hurtful beverage which they give unknown to persons 
to secure love is made as follows : — On any of the nights mentioned they collect in 
the meadows gander-goose (Romani, vast bengeszkero — devil's hand; in Latin, Orchis 
maculata; German, Knabe?ikraut), the yellow roots of which they dry and crush and mix 
with their menses, and this they introduce to the food of the person whose love 
they wish to secure." 

Of the same character is a potion which they prepare as followsi: On 
the day of Saint John they catch a green frog and put it in a closed earthen 
receptacle full of small holes, and this they place in an ant-hill. The ants 
eat the frog and leave the skeleton. This is ground to powder, mixed with 
the blood of a bat and dried bath-flies and shaped into small buns, which 
are, as the chance occurs, put secretly into the food of the person to be 
charmed. 



i2o GYPSY SORCERY. 

There is yet another charm connected with this which I leave in the 
original Latin in which it is modestly given by Dr. Wlislocki : " Qualibet 
supradictarum noctium occiduntur duo canes nigri, mas et femina, quorum 
genitalia exstirpata ad condensationem coquntur. Hujus materia? particula 
consumpta quemvis invincibili amore facit exardescare in earn eamve, qui 
hoc medio prodigioso usus est." 

It may be remarked that these abominable charms are also not only 
known to the Tuscan witches of the present day, but are found in Voodoo 
sorcery, and are indeed all over the world. To use revolting means in 
black sorcery may be, or perhaps certainly is, spontaneous-sporadic, but 
when we find the peculiar details of the processes identical, we are so much 
nearer to transmission or history that the burden of disproving must fall 
on the doubter. 



"To the less revolting philtres belongs one in which the girl puts the ashes of 
a burnt piece of her dress which had been wet with perspiration and has, perhaps, 
hair adhering to it, into a man's food or drink (also Tuscan). 

"To bury the foot of a badger (also Voodoo), or the eye of a crow, under one's, 
sleeping-place is believed to excite or awaken love. 

"According to gypsy belief one can spread love by transplanting blood, perspira- 
tion, or hair into the body of a person. 

" By burning the hair, blood, or saliva of any one, his or her love can be 
extinguished. 

"The following is a charm used to punish a faithless lover. The deceived maid, 
lights a candle at midnight and pricks it several times with a needle, saying : — 

" ' Pchagerav momely 
Pchagera tre vodyi ! ' 

" ' Thrice the candle's broke by me 
Thrice thy heart shall broken be ! ' 

"If the faithless lover marries another, the girl mixes the broken shell of a. 
crab in his food or drink, or hides one of her hairs in a bird's nest. This will 
make the marriage unhappy, and the husband will continually pine for his neglected 
sweetheart." 



SHOES AND LOVE-POTIONS, OR PHILTRES. 12 r 

This last charm is allied to another current among the Slavonians, 
and elsewhere mentioned, by which it is believed that if a bird gets any 
of a man's hair and works it into a nest he will suffer terribly till it 
is completely decayed. 




17 




CHAPTER VIII. 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES AND SUPERSTITIONS, 
CONNECTED WITH THOSE OF THE GYPSIES. 



N her very interesting account of Rou- 
manian superstitions, Mrs. E. Gerard 
(" The Land Beyond the Forest " ), finds 
three distinct sources for them : firstly, 
the indigenous, which seems to have been 
formed by or adapted to the wild and 
picturesque scenery and character of the 
country; secondly, those derived from the 
old German customs and beliefs brought 
by the so-called Saxon, in reality Lower 
Rhenish colonists ; and thirdly, the in- 
fluence of the gypsies, "themselves a race 
of fortune-tellers and witches." All these 
kinds of superstition have twined and 
intermingled, acted and reacted upon one 
^ another so that in many cases it becomes 

a difficult matter to determine the exact parentage of some particular 

belief or custom. 




ROUMANIAN AND TRANS YLVANI AN SORCERIES. 123 

It may be often difficult to ascertain in what particular country or 
among what people a superstition was, last found, but there is very 
little trouble when we compare the great body of all such beliefs of 
all races and ages and thereby find the parent sources. It is not many 
years since philologists, having taken up some favourite language — for 
instance, Irish — discovering many words in many tongues almost identical 
with others in " Earse," boldly claimed that this tongue was the 
original of all the others. Now we find the roots of them all in the 
Aryan. So when we examine Folk-lore, it is doubtless of great im- 
portance that we should learn where a tradition last lived ; but we must 
not stop there — we must keep on inquiring till we reach the beginning. 
As a rule, with little exception, when we find anywhere the grosser 
forms of fetish and black witchcraft, we may conclude that we have 
remains of the world's oldest faith, or first beginning of supernaturalism 
in suffering and terror, a fear of mysterious evil influences. For with 
all due respect to the fact that such superstitions might have sprung up 
sporadically wherever similar causes existed to create them, it is, in the 
first place, a very rare chance that they should assume exactly like 
forms. Secondly, we must consider that as there are even now millions 
of people who receive with ready faith and carefully nurse these 
primaeval beliefs, so there has been from the beginning of time abundant 
opportunity for their transmission and growth. Thirdly, nothing is so 
quickly transmitted as Folk-lore, which in one sense includes myths and 
religion. If jade was in the prehistoric stone age carried from Iona or 
Tartary all over Europe, it is even more probable that myths went with 
it quite as far and fast. 

It is not by loose, fanciful, and careless guess-work as to how the 
resemblance of Greek or Norse legends to those of the Red Indians is 
due to similar conditions of climate and life, that we shall arrive at 
facts ; neither will the truth be ascertained by assuming that there was- 
a certain beginning of them all in a certain country, or that they were 
all developed out of one mythology, be it solar or Shemitic, Hindoo or 



I24 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Hebrew. What we want is impartial examination — comparison and 
analysis. On this basis we find that all the Folk-lore or magic of Europe, 
and especially of its Eastern portion, has a great deal which is derived 
from black witchcraft, or from the succeeding Shamanism. When we 
find that a superstition is based on fertility, the " mystery of generation," 
or " Phallic worship" — as, for instance, wearing boars' teeth or a little pig 
for a charm — we may conclude that it is very ancient, but still not older 
than the time when wise men had begun to reflect on the mysteries of 
birth and death and weave them into myths. The exorcism of diseases 
as devils, and the belief that they, in common with other evils, may be 
drummed, or smoked, or incanted away into animals, trees, and streams, 
belongs in most cases to Shamanism. In all probability the oldest sorcery 
of all was entirely concerned with driving out devils and injuring enemies 
— just as most of the play of small boys runs to fighting or the 
semblance of it, or as the mutual relations of most animals in the lower 
stages consist of devouring one another. This was the very beginning 
of the beginnings, and it would be really marvellous that so much of it 
has survived were it not that to the one who is not quite dazzled or 
blinded by modern enlightenment there is still existent a great outer 
circle of human darkness, and that this darkness may be found in 
thousands of intermittent varying shadows or marvellous chiaroscuro, 
even in the brightest sun-pictures of modern life. As 1 write I have 
before me a copy of the Philadelphia Press, of April 14, 1889, in 
which a J. C. Batford, M.D., advertises that if any one will send him 
two two-cent postage stamps — i.e., twopence — " with a lock of your hair, 
name, age, and sex," he will send a clairvoyant diagnosis of your 
disease. This divining by the lock of hair is extremely ancient, and 
had its origin in the belief that he who could obtain one from 
an enemy could reach his soul and kill him. From communicating a 
disease by means of such a lock, and ascertaining what was the 
matter with a man, in the same manner, was a very obvious step 
forward. 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 125 

Of all people living in Europe the peasantry of Italy and Sicily 
and the gypsies seem to have retained most of this Shamanism and 
witchcraft, and as the latter have been for centuries its chief priests, 
travelling here and there disseminating it, we may conclude that even 
where they did not originate it they have been active in keeping the 
old faith alive. In Roumania, where the gypsy is called in to conjure 
on all occasions, " people believe themselves to be surrounded by whole 
legions of devils, witches, and goblins." There is scarcely a day 
or hour in which these bad spirits have not power, " and a whole 
complicated system, about as laborious as the mastering an unknown 
language, is required in order to teach an unfortunate peasant to 
steer clear of the dangers by which he supposes himself to be 
beset." 

On Wednesday and Friday no one should use needle or scissors, 
bake bread, or sow flax. No bargain should ever be concluded on 
a Friday, and Venus, here called Paraschiva, to whom this day is sacred, 
punishes all infractions of the law. There was among the Wends 
a flax-goddess, Pscipolnitza, and the shears as emblematic of death are 
naturally antipathetic to Venus, the source of life. Whether Mars has 
anything in common with Mors I know not, but in Roumania he is 
decidedly an evil spirit of death, whence Marti, or Tuesday, is one, when 
spinning is positively prohibited (here we have Venus again), and washing 
the hands and combing the hair are not unattended with danger. 
Whence it appears that the devil agrees with not a few saints in 
detesting neatness of the person. And as it is unlucky to wash anything 
on Saturday, or to spin on Thursday, or to work in the fields on 
Thursday between Easter and Pentecost, it will be seen that Laziness 
and Dirt have between them a fine field in Roumania. Add to this 
that, as in Russia, more than half the days in the year are Saints' days, 
or fast days or festivals on which it is " unlucky " to work at all, and 
we find that industry cannot be said to be much encouraged by Faith in 
anv of its forms. This belief in holy days which bring ill-luck to those 



j 26 G K/^SF sorcer y. 

who work on them, which is still flourishing in every country in the 
world, goes back to time whereof the memory of man hath naught to 
the contrary. A distinct difference is here to be observed however 
between naturally resting: from work on certain days, which is of course 
an inherent instinct in all mankind, and the declaring such rest to be 
obligatory, and its infraction punishable by death, disaster, and bad luck, 
and still more the increasing such Sabbaths to such an extent as to 
interfere with industry, or the turning them into fast days or Saints' days 
with " observances." Here the old Shamanism comes in, if not the evil 
witchcraft itself which exacted penance and fasting, and ceremonies to- 
exorcise the devils. The first belief was that evil spirits inflicted pain 
on man, and that man, by efforts which cost him suffering, could 
repel or retaliate on them. This was simple action and reaction, and 
the repulsion was effected with starving, enduring smoke, or using repul- 
sive and filthy objects. Out of this in due time came penance of all 
kinds. 

The Oriental or Greek Church is found at every turn, even more 
than the Catholic, interchanged, twined, and confused with ancient sorcery. 
Theodore, like Saint Simeon and Anthony in Tuscany, is very much, 
more of a goblin than a holy man. His weakness is young women, and 
sometimes in the shape of a beautiful youth, at others of a frightful 
monster, he carries off those who are found working on his day — that 
is the 23rd of January. Theodore, according to the Solar mycolo- 
gists personifies the sun. (De Gubernatis, " Zoological Mythology," 
vol. ii. p. 296). In any case the saint who seizes girls is the Hindoo 
Krishna or his prototype, and therefore may have come through the 
gypsies. The overworked solar myth derives some support from the fact 
that among the Serbs on Theodore's day the Sintotere — or centaur, as 
the name declares — who is half horse and half man, rides over the 
people who fall in his power. The Centaurs were connected with the 
"rape of maidens," as shown in the legend of the Lapithce, and it is 
very probable that Theodore himself is, in the language of the Western 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 127 

Americans, " half a horse," which they regard as the greatest compliment 
which can be paid to a man. 1 

" Wonderful potions and salves," says Mrs. Gerard, " composed of 
the fat of bears, dogs, snakes, and snails, with the oil of rain-worms, 
spiders, and midges, rubbed into a paste, are concocted by these Bohe- 
mians (i.e., gypsies). Saxon and Roumanian mothers are often in the 
habit of giving a child to be nursed for nine days to some Tzigane 
women supposed to have power to undo the spell." 

These revolting ingredients are not the result of modern invention, 
but relics of the primitive witchcraft or Ur-religion, which was founded 
on pain, terror, and the repulsive. Among other Roumanian-Romany 
traditions are the following : — 

Swallows here as elsewhere are luck-bringing birds, and termed 
■Galiniele lui Dieu — fowls of the Lord. So in England we hear that : — 

" The robin and the wren 
Are God Almighty's cock and hen." 

There is always a treasure to be found where the first swallow is 
seen. Among the Romans when it was observed one ran to the nearest 
fountain and washed his eyes, and then during the whole year to come, 
dolorem omnem oculorum tuorum hirundines auferant — the swallows will carry 
away all your complaints of the eyes. 

The skull of a horse over the gate of a courtyard, or the bones 
of fallen animals buried under the doorstep are preservatives against 
ghosts. In Roman architecture the skulls of oxen, rams, and horses con- 
tinually occur as a decoration, and they are used as charms to-day in 

1 Though not connected with this work, I cannot help observing that this extra- 
ordinary simile probably originated in a very common ornament used as a figure- 
head, or in decorations, on Mississippi steamboats, as well as ships. This is the sea- 
horse {hippocampus), which may be often seen of large size, carved and gilt. Its fish 
• tail might be easily confused with that of an alligator. Pr>t.torius (1666) enumerates, 
among other monsters, the horse-crccodile. 



I2 8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Tuscany. Black fowls are believed to be in the service of witches 
The skull of a ram placed at the boundary of a parish in Roumania 
keeps off disease from cattle ; it was evidently a fetish in all ages. In 
Slavonian, Esthonian, and Italian tales black poultry occur as diabolical 
— to appease the devil a black cock must be sacrificed. But in Roumania 
the (black) Brahmaputra fowl is believed, curiously enough, to be the 
offspring of the devil and a Jewish girl — truly an insignificant result of 
such clever parentage. 

A cow that has wandered away will be safe from witches if the 
owner sticks a pair of scissors or shears in the centre crossbeam of the 
dwelling-room. The Folk-lore of shears is extensive ; Friedrich derives 
it from the cutting of the threads of life by the Fates. Thus Juno 
appears on a Roman coin (Eckhel, " Numis. Vet. " viii. p. 358) as 
holding the shears of death. The swallow is said in a Swedish fairy tale 
to have been the handmaid of the Virgin Mary, and to have stolen her 
scissors, for which reason she was turned into a bird — the swallow's tail 
being supposed to resemble that article. Gypsies in England use the 
shears in incantations. 

A whirlwind denotes that the devil is dancing with a witch, and he 
who approaches too near it may be carried off bodily to hell (as has indeed 
happened to many a wicked Pike in a cyclone or blizzard in Western 
America), though he may escape by losing his cap. 

It is very dangerous to point at a rainbow or an approaching thunder- 
storm. Probably the devil who here guides the whirlwind or directs the 
storm regards the act as impolite. He punishes those who thus indicate 
the rainbow by a gnawing disease. Lightning is averted by sticking a 
knife in a loaf of bread and spinning the two on the floor of the loft of 
the house while the storm lasts. The knife appears not only in many 
gypsy spells, but in the Etruscan-Florentine magic. 

The legends of Domdaniel and the College of Sorcery in Salamanca 
appear in the gypsy Roumanian Scholomance, or school which exists some- 
where far away deep in the heart of the mountains, " where the secrets 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 129 

of nature, the language of animals, and all magic spells are taught by the 
devil in person." Only ten scholars are admitted at a time, and when the 
course of learning has expired nine are dismissed to their homes, but the 
tenth is detained by the professor in payment. Henceforth, mounted on 
an ismeju, or dragon, he becomes the devil's aide-de-camp, and assists 
him in preparing thunderbolts and managing storms and tempests, 
"A small lake, immeasurably deep, high up in the mountains, south 
of Hermanstadt, is supposed to be the caldron in which the dragon lies 
sleeping and where the thunder is brewed." 

" Whoever turns three somersaults the first time he hears thunder will 
be free from pains in the back during the twelvemonth." Of this pre- 
scription — which reads as if it had originated with Timothy, in "Japhet 
in Search of a Father," when he practised as a mountebank — it may be 
said that it is most unlikely that any person who is capable of putting it 
in practice should suffer with such pains. 

To be free from headache rub the forehead with a piece of iron or 
stone. This may be a presage of the electric cure or of that by ' c metallic 
tractors." 

It is unfortunate in all Catholic countries to meet with a priest or 
nun, especially when he or she is the first person encountered in the morning. 
Tn Roumania this is limited to the Greek popa. But to be first met by 
a gypsy on going forth is a very fortunate omen indeed. According to 
a widely-spread and ancient belief it is also very lucky to meet with anv 
woman of easy virtue — the easier the better. This is doubtless derived 
from the ancient worship of Venus, and the belief that any thing or person 
connected with celibacy and chastity, such as a nun, is unlucky. It would 
appear from this that the Roumanians, or their gypsy oracles, have formed 
an opinion that their own popas are strictly abstinent as regards love, while 
Protestant priests marry and are accordingly productive. Why the Catholic 
clergy are included with the latter is not at all clear. It is lucky also to 
meet a gypsy at any time, and doubtless this belief has been well encouraged 
by the Romany. 

18 



I3 o GYPSY SORCERY. 

"It's kushti bale to wellan a Rom, 
When tute's a pirryin pre the drom." 

" When you are going along the street 
It's lucky a gypsy man to meet." 

Likewise, it is lucky to meet with a woman carrying a jug full of 
water, &c, but unlucky if it be empty. So in the New Testament the 
virgins whose lamps were full of oil received great honour. The lamp 
was an ancient symbol of life ; hence it is very often found covered with 
aphrodisiac symbols or made in Phallic forms. It is barely possible that 
common old popular simile of " Not by a jug-full " — meaning " not by 
a great deal "—is derived from this association of a full vessel with 
abundance. 

It is a Roumanian gypsy custom to do homage to the Wodna zena, 
or " Water-woman " (Hungarian gypsy, Nivashi), by spilling a few drops 
of water on the ground after filling a jug, and it is regarded as an insult 
to offer drink without observing this ceremony. A Roumanian will never 
draw water against the current (also as in the Hungarian gypsy charms), 
as it would provoke the water-spirit. If water is drawn in the night- 
time, whoever does so must blow three times over the brimming jug, and 
pour a few drops on the coals. 

The mythology of the Roumanians agrees with that of the gypsies. 
It is sylvan, and Indian. In deep pools of water lurks the dreadful balaur 
or Wodna muz — i.e., the Waterman (Muz is both gypsy and Slavonian) — 
who lies in wait for victims. In every forest lives the mama ftadura, or 
weshni dye — "the forest mother" — who is believed to be benevolent to 
human beings, especially towards children who have lost their way in the 
wood. But the Panusch is an amorous spirit who, like the wanton satyrs 
of old, haunts the silent woodland shades, and lies in wait for helpless 
maids. "Surely," observes Mrs. Gerard, "this is a corruption of 'great 
Pan,' who is not dead after all, but merely banished to the land beyond 
the forest." What a find this would have been for Heine when writing 
" The Gods in Exile " ! 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 131 

" In deep forests and lonely mountain gorges there wanders about a wild 
huntsman of superhuman size." He appears to be of a mysterious nature, 
and is very seldom seen. Once he met a peasant who had shot ninety- 
nine bears, and warned him never to attempt to kill another. But the 
peasant disregarded his advice, and, missing his aim, was torn in pieces 
by the bear. 

Very singular is the story that this Lord of the Forest once taught a 
hunter — that if he loaded his gun on New Year's Night with a live adder 
he would never miss a shot during the ensuing year. It is not probable 
that he was told to put a live and "wiggling" snake into his gun. The 
story of itself suggests the firing out the ramrod for luck. It has been 
observed by C. Lloyd Morgan that if a drop of the oil of a foul tobacco 
pipe be placed in the mouth of a snake the muscles instantly become set 
in knotted lumps and the creature becomes rigid. If much is given the 
snake dies, but if only a small amount is employed it may be restored. 
This, as Mr. Oakley has suggested, may explain the stories of Indian 
snake-charmers being able to turn a snake into a stick. It is performed 
by spitting into the snake's mouth and then placing the hand on its head 
till it becomes stiffened. " The effect may be produced by opium or some 
other narcotic." And it may also occur to the reader that the jugglers 
who performed before Pharaoh were not unacquainted with this mystery. 
It is probable that the hunter in the gypsy Roumanian story first gave 
his adder tobacco before firing it off. 

The Om ren, or wild man, is a malevolent forest spectre, the terror 
of hunters and shepherds. He is usually seen in winter, and when he 
finds an intruder on his haunts, he tears up pine trees by the roots with 
which he slays the victim, or throws him over a precipice, or overwhelms 
him with rocks. In every detail he corresponds to a being greatly feared 
by the Algonkin Indians of America. 

The oameni micuti, or " small men," are grey-bearded dwarfs, dressed 
like miners. They are the kobolds or Bergmannchen of Germany. They 
seldom harm a miner, and when one has perished in the mine they make 



i 3 2 GYPSY SORCERY. 

it known to his family by three knocks on his door. They may be heard 
quarrelling among themselves and hitting at one another with their axes, 
or blowing their horns as a signal of battle. These " horns of Elf-land 
blowing " connect them with the Korriagan of Brittany, who are fairies 
who always carry and play on the same instrument. Presto ri us devotes 
a long chapter to all the learning extant on the subject of these Bergmann- 
rigen, or Subterraneans. 

The mountain monk is the very counterpart of Friar Rush in English 
fairy-lore, and is also of Indian origin. He delights in kicking over 
water-pails, putting out lamps, and committing mischief, merry, mad, or sad. 
Sometimes he. has been known to strangle workmen whom he dislikes, 
though, on the other hand, he often helps distressed miners by filling 
their empty lamps or guiding those who have lost their way. But he 
always bids them keep it a secret, and if they tell they suffer for it. 

Gana is queen of the witches, and corresponds to the Diana of the 
Italians. Gana is probably only a variation of the word Diana. Among 
the Wallachians this goddess is in fact known as JDina and Sina. She, 
like the wilde Jager, rushes in headlong hunt over the heavens or through 
the skies followed by a throng of witches and fairies. " People show the 
places where she has passed, and where the grass and leaves are dry" 
(Friedrich). She is a powerful enchantress, and is strongest in her sorcery 
about Easter- tide. To guard against her the Wallachians at this time carry 
a piece of lime-tree or linden wood. She is a beautiful but terrible 
enchantress, who presides over the evil spirits -vho meet on May eve. 
She was the ruler of all Transylvania (a hunting country) before Christianity 
prevailed there. Her beauty bewitched many, but whoever let himself be 
lured into drinking mead from her urus (or wild ox) drinking-horn perished. 
She is like the Norse Freya, a cat goddess, and seems to be allied to the 
Chesme, or cat, or fountain-spirit of the Turks. According to. ancient 
Indian mythology the moon is a cat who chases .the mice (stars) of 
night, and in the fifth book of Ovid's " Metamorphoses," when the gods 
fled from the giants Diana took the form of a cat : 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 133 

" Fele soror Phoebi, nivea Saturni^a vacca 
Pisce Venus latuit." 

. (V. 325, 332.) 

" According to the Hellenic cosmogony the sun and moon created 
the animals — the sun creating the lion and the moon the cat " (De 
Gubernatis, " Zoological Mythology," ii. 58). Gertrude, the chief 
sorceress or queen of the witches in old German lore, appears when dead 
as surrounded by mice ; she is, in fact, a cat. The Turkish Chesme, or 
fountain-cat, inveigles youths to death like the Gana, Diana, or Lorelei, who 
does the same, and is also a water-sprite. 

The Dschuma is a fierce virgin, or sometimes an old witch, who is 
incarnate disease, such as the cholera. She is supposed to suffer from cold 
and nakedness, and may be heard at night when disease is raging, wailing 
for want. Then the maidens make garments and hang them out ; but 
it is a most effective charm when seven old women spin, weave, and sew 
for her a scarlet shirt all in one night without once speaking. 

A curious book might be written on the efficacy of nakedness in 
witch-spells. In some places in Roumania there is a spirit always naked 
(at least appearing such), who requires a new suit of clothes every year. 
These are given by the inhabitants of the district haunted by such an elf, 
who on New Year's Night lay them out in some place supposed to be 
frequented by him or her. 

In 1866, in a Wallachian village in the district of Bihar, to avert 
the cholera, six youths and maidens, all quite naked, traced with a 
ploughshare a furrow round their village to form a charmed circle over 
which the disease could not pass. 

When the land is suffering from long droughts the Roumanians 
ascribe it to the gypsies, who by occult means make dry weather in order 
to favour their own trade of brickmaking. When the necessary rain 
cannot be obtained by beating the guilty Tziganes, the peasants resort 
to the Papaluga, or Rain-maiden. For this they strip a young gypsy girl 
stark-naked, and then cover her up in flowers and leaves, leaving only 



i 3 4 GYPSY SORCERY 

the head visible. Thus adorned the Papaluga, or Miss Jack-in-the-Green,, 
is conducted with music round the village, every person pouring water on 
her as she passes. When a gypsy girl cannot be had, or the Tziganes 
are supposed to be innocent, a Roumanian maiden may be taken. This 
custom is very widely spread. 

Forty years ago there was a strange mania in the northern cities of the 
United States for " fast " girls of the most reckless kind to go out naked 
very late by night into the street to endeavour to run around a public 
square or block of houses and regain their homes without being caught by 
the police. I suspect that superstition suggested this strange risk. It is 
an old witch-charm that if a girl can, when the moon is full, go forth 
and run around a certain enclosure, group of trees, or dwelling, without 
being seen, she will marry the man whom she loves. There are also 
many magical ceremonies which, to ensure success, must be performed in 
full moonlight and when quite naked. " Among the Saxons in Transylvania 
when there is a very severe drought it is customary in some places for 
several girls, led by an old woman, and all of them absolutely naked, 
to go at midnight to the courtyard of some peasant and steal his harrow. 
With this they walk across fields to the nearest stream, where the harrow 
is put afloat with a burning light on each corner" (Mrs. Gerard, "Land 
Beyond," &c). This is evidently the old Hindoo floating of lamps by 
maidens on the Ganges, and in all probability of gypsy importation. 

She who will pronounce a certain spell, strip herself quite naked, and 
can steal into the room where a man is lying sound asleep and can clip 
from his head a lock of hair and escape without awakening him or 
meeting any one will obtain absolute mastery over him, or at least over 
his affections. The hair must be worn in a bag or ring on the person. 
But woe unto her who is caught, since in that case the enchantment " all 
goes the other way." Once a beautiful but very poor Hungarian maid 
gave all she had to a young gypsy girl for a charm to win the love of a 
certain lord, and was taught this, which proved to be a perfect success. 
Having clipped the lock of hair she wove it in a ring and wedded him. 






ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 135 

After a time she died, and the gypsy being called in to dress the corpse 
found and kept the ring. Then the lord fell in love with the gypsy 
and married her. But ere long she too died, and was buried, and the 
ring with her. And from that day the lord seemed as if possessed to 
sit by her grave, and finally built a house there, and never seemed happy 
save when in it. 

" If a Roumanian maid," says Mrs. Gerard, " desires to see her future 
husband's face in the water she has only to step naked at midnight into 
the nearest lake or river, or, if she shrink from this, let her take a stand 
on the more congenial dung-hill with a piece of Christmas cake in her 
mouth, and as the clock strikes twelve listen attentively for the first sound 
of a dog's bark. From whichever side it proceeds will also come the 
expected suitor." 

A naked maid standing on a " congenial dung-hill " with a piece 
of Christmas cake in her mouth would be a subject for an artist which 
should be eagerly seized in these days when " excuses for the nude in art " 
are becoming so rare. It is worth observing that this conjuration is very 
much like one observed in Tuscany, in which Saint Anthony is invoked 
to manifest by a dog's barking at night, as by other sounds, whether the 
applicant, or invoker, shall obtain her desire. 

At the birth of a child in Wallachia every one present takes a stone 
and throws it behind him, saying, " This into the jaws of the Streghoi " * 
— "a custom," says Mrs. Gerard, ' c which would seem to suggest Saturn 
and the swaddled up stones." It is much more suggestive of the stones 
thrown by Deucalion and Pyrrha. Strigoi is translated as "evil spirits" — 
it is evidently, originally at least, the streghe, or witches of Italy, from the 
Latin strix, the dreaded witch-bird of Ovid. " Festus derives the word 
a stringendo from the opinion that thev strangle children." Middle Latin 
Strega (Paulus Grillandus). For much learning on this subject of the 
Strix the reader may consult De Gubernatis, " Myth of Animals," vol. ii. 
p. 202. 

1 Schott, " Wallachische Mahrchen," p. 297. Stuttgart, 1845. 



I3 6 . GYPSY SORCERY. 

"As long as the child is unbaptized it must be carefully watched 
for fear lest it be changed or stolen away." This is common to Christians, 
heathen, and gypsies to watch it for several days. " A piece of iron, or 
a broom laid beneath the pillow will keep spirits away." So in Roumania 
and Tuscany. Quintus Serenus, however, recommends that when the 
striga atra presses the infant, garlic be used, the strong odour of which 
(to their credit be it said) is greatly detested by witches. 

" The Romans used to cook their ccena demonum for the house- 
spirits, and the Hindoos prepared food for them." From them it has 
passed through the gypsies to Eastern Europe, and now the Roumanian r 
who has by a simple ceremony made a contract with the devil, receives- 
from him an attendant spirit called a spiridsui or spiridush which will 

"Serve his master faithfully 
For seven long year," 

but in return expecting the first mouthful of every dish eaten by his. 

master. 

" So many differing fancies have mankind, 
That they the master-sprites may spell and bind." 

Nearly connected with the Roumanian we have the beliefs in magic 
of the Transylvanian Saxons, all of them shared with the gypsies and 
probably partially derived from them. Many people must have 
wondered what could have been the origin of the saying in reference- 
to a very small place that " there was not room to swing a cat in 
it." ' c But I don't want to swing a cat in it," was the very natural 
rejoinder of a well-known American litterateur to this remark applied to 
his house. It is possible that we may find the origin of this odd saying 
in a superstition current in Transylvania, whither it in all probability 
was carried by the gypsies, whose specialty it is to bear the seeds of 
superstitions about here and there as the winds do those of plants. In 
this country it is said that if a cat runs away, when recovered she 
must be swung three times round to attach her to the dwelling. 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 137 

The same is done by a stolen cat by the thief if he would retain it. 
Truly this seems a strange way to induce an attachment — or pour 
encourager les autres. It is evident, however, that to the professional cat- 
stealer the size of his room must be a matter of some importance. 
It is a pity that this saying and faith were unknown to Moncrief- 
Maradan, "the Historiogriffe of Cats," (" CEuvres," Paris, 1794), who 
would assuredly have made the most of it. 

As regards entering new houses in Transylvania the rule is not 
<{ Devil take the hindmost," but the foremost. The first person or being 
who enters the maiden mansion must die, therefore it is safe to throw 
in a preliminary dog or cat. The scape-cat is, however, to be preferred. 

I can remember once, when about six years of age, looking down 
into a well in Massachusetts and being told that the reflection which 
I saw was the face of a little boy who lived there. This made a deep 
impression on me, and I reflected that it was very remarkable that the 
dweller in the well could assume the appearance of every one who looked 
at him. In Transylvania it is, says Mrs. E. Gerard, " dangerous to 
stare down long into a well, for the well-dame who dwells at the 
bottom is easily offended. But children are often curious, and so, bending 
over the edge, they call out mockingly, ' Dame of the Well, pull me 
down into it ! ' and then run away rapidly." 

Whoever has been robbed and wishes to find the thief should 
take a black hen, and for nine Fridays must with the hen fast strictly ; 
the thief will then either bring back the plunder or die. This is 
called " taking up the black fast " against any one. It is said that a 
peasant of Petersdorf returned one day from Bistritz with 200 florins, 
which he had received for oxen. Being very tipsy he laid down to 
sleep, having first hidden his money in a hole in the kitchen wall. 
When he awoke he missed his coin, and having quite forgotten what 
he had done with it believed it had been stolen. So he went to an 
old Wallachian, probably a gypsy, and induced him to take up the black 
fast against the thief. But as he himself had the money the spell worked 

19 



'3* 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



against him and he grew weaker and pined away as it went on. By- 
some chance at the last moment he found his money, but it was too late, 
and he died. Pages of black hen-lore may be gathered from the works of 
Friedrich, De Gubernatis and others ; suffice it to say that Bubastis, the 
Egyptian moon-goddess, appears to have been the original mistress of 
the mysterious animal, if not the black hen as well as cat herself, and 
mother of all the witches. 

Magic qualities are attached in Hungary as in Germany to the lime 
or linden tree ; in some villages it is usual to plant one before a house to 
prevent witches from entering. From very early times the lime tree was 
sacred to Venus among the Greeks, as it was to Lada among the Slavo- 
nians. This, it is said, was due to its leaves being of the shape of 
a heart. In a Slavonian love-song the wooer exclaims : — 

"As the bee is drawn by the lime-perfume (or linden-bloom) 
My heart is drawn by thee." 

This was transmitted to Christian symbolism, whence the penance 
laid by Christ on Mary Magdalen was that "she should have no other 
food save lime-tree leaves, drink naught except the dew which hung on 
them, and sleep on no other bed save one made of its leaves " (Menzel, 
" Christliche Symbolik," vol. ii. p. 57). " For Magdalena had loved 
much, therefore her penance was by means of that which is a symbol of 
love." 

Mrs. Gerard tells us that " a particular growth of vine leaf, whose 
exact definition I have not succeeded in rightly ascertaining, is eagerly 
sought by Saxon girls in some villages. Whoever finds it, puts it in her 
hair, and if she then kisses the first man she meets on her way home 
she will soon be married. A story is related of a girl, who having 
found this growth, meeting a nobleman in a carriage stopped the 
horses and begged leave to kiss him." To which he consented. This 
particular growth, unknown to Mrs. Gerard, is when the leaves or 
tendrils or shoots form a natural knot. Among the gypsies in Hungary, 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 139 

as may be elsewhere read, such knots in the willow are esteemed as of 
great magic efficacy in love. A knot is a symbol of true love in all 
countries. 

" This knot I tic, this knot I knit, 
For that true love whom I know not yet." 

On Easter Monday in Transylvania the lads run about the 
towns and villages sprinkling with water all the girls or women whom they 
meet. This is supposed to cause the flax to grow well. On the following 
day the girls return the attention by watering the boys. " This custom, 
which appears to be a very old one," says Mrs. Gerard, " is also prevalent 
among various Slav races, such as Poles and Serbs. In Poland it used to 
be de rigeur that water be poured over a girl who was still asleep, so in 
every house a victim was selected who had to feign sleep and patiently 
receive the cold shower-bath, which was to ensure the luck of the family 
during the year. The custom has now become modified to suit a more 
delicate age, and instead of formidable horse-buckets of water, dainty little 
perfume squirts have come to be used in many places." As the custom 
not only of sprinkling water, but also of squirting or spraying perfumes is 
from ancient India (as it is indeed prevalent all over the East), it is 
probable that the gypsies who are always foremost in all festivals may 
have brought this " holi " custom to Eastern Europe. Of late it has 
•extended to London, as appears by the following extract from The St. 
James's Gazette, April, 1889. 

"The newest weapon of terror in the West End is the 'scent revolver.' Its use 
is simple. You dine — not wisely but the other thing — and then you stroll into the Park, 
with your nickel-plated scent revolver in your pocket. Feeling disposed for a frolic, you 
walk up to a woman, present your weapon, pull the trigger, and in a moment she is 
drenched, not with gore but with scent, which is nearly as unpleasant if not quite so 
deadly. Mr. Andrew King, who amused himself in that way, has been fined 10s. at 
Marlborough Street. Let us hope that the 'revolver' was confiscated into the bargain." 

One way of interrogating fate in love affairs is to slice an apple in 



i 4 o GYPSY SORCERY. 

two with a sharp knife ; if this can be done without cutting a seed the 
wish of the heart will be fulfilled. Of yore, in many lands the apple was 
ever sacred to love, wisdom, and divination. Once in Germany a well- 
formed child became, through bewitchment, sorely crooked and cramped ; 
by the advice of a monk the mother cut an apple in three pieces and 
made the child eat them, whereupon it became as before. In Illzach, in 
Alsace, there is a custom called c< Andresle." On Saint Andrew's Eve 
a girl must take from a widow, and without returning thanks for it, an 
apple. As in Hungary she cuts it in two and must eat one half of it 
before midnight, and the other half after it ; then in sleep she will see 
her future husband. And there is yet another love-spell of the split 
apple given by Scheible ("Die gute alte Zeit," Stuttgart, 1847, P- 2 97) 
which runs as follows : — 

" On Friday early as may be, 
Take the fairest apple from a tree, 
Then in thy blood on paper white 
Thy own name and thy true love's write, 
That apple thou in two shalt cut, 
And for its cure that paper put, 
With two sharp pins of myrtle wood > 
Join the halves till it seem good, 
In the oven let it dry, 
And wrapped in leaves of myrtle lie, 
Under the pillow of thy dear, 
Yet let it be unknown to her ; 
And if it a secret be 
She soon will show her love for thee." 

Similar apple sorceries were known to the Norsemen. Because the apple 
was so nearly connected with love and luxury — " Geschlectsliebe und Zeu- 
gungslust" — those who were initiated in the mysteries and vowed to chastity 
were forbidden to eat it. And for the same reason apples, hares, and 
Cupids, or "Amorets," were often depicted together. In Genesis, as in 
the Canticles of Solomon, apples, or at least the fruit from which the 



ROUMANIAN AND TRANSYLVANIAN SORCERIES. 141 

modern apple inherited its traditions are a symbol of sexual love. In 
Florence women wishing for children go to a priest and get from him a 
blessed apple, over which they pronounce an incantation to Santa Anna — 
la Sari Na — who was the Lucina of the Latins. 





CHAPTER IX. 



THE RENDEZVOUS OR MEETINGS OF WITCHES, SORCERERS, AND VILAS. 
CONTINUATION OF SOUTH SLAVONIAN GYPSY-LORE. 

N Eastern Europe witches and their kin, or kind, 
r assemble on the eve of Saint John and of Saint 
George, Christmas and Easter, at cross-roads on 
the broad pustas, or prairies, and there brew 
their magic potions. This, as Dr. Krauss 
observes, originated in feasts held at the same 
time in pre-Christian times. " So it was that a 
thousand years ago old and young assembled 
in woods or on plains to bring gifts to 
their gods, and celebrated with dances, 
games, and offerings the festival of spring, 
or of awaking and blooming Nature. These 
celebrations have taken Christian names, but 
innumerable old heathen rites and customs 
are still to be found in them." It may be 
here observed that mingled with these are 
many of a purely gypsy-Oriental origin, 
which came from the same source and which it remains for careful 




THE RENDEZVOUS OR MEETINGS OF WITCHES. 143 

ethnologists and critical Folk-lorists to disentangle and make clear. 
The priestesses of prehistoric times on these occasions performed cere- 
monies, as was natural, to protect cattle or land from evil influences. To 
honour their deities the " wise women " bore certain kinds of boughs and 
adorned animals with flowers and wreaths. The new religion declared 
that this was all sorcery and devil-work, but the belief in the efficacy of 
the rites continued. The priestesses became witches, or Vilas, the terms 
being often confused, but they were still feared and revered. 

In all the South Slavonian country the peasants on Saint George's 
Day adorn the horns of cattle with garlands, in gypsy Indian style, to 
protect them from evil influences. I have observed that even in Egypt 
among Mahometans Saint George is regarded with great reverence, and 
I knew one who on this day always sacrificed a sheep. The cow or ox 
which is not thus decorated becomes a prey in some way to witches. The 
garlands are hung up at night over the stable door, where they remain 
all the ensuing year. If a peasant neglects to crown his cow, he not only 
does not receive a certain fee from its owner, but is in danger of being 
beaten. On the same day the shepherdess, or cow-herd, takes in one 
hand salt, in the other a potsherd containing live coals. In the coals 
roses are burned. By this means witches lose all power over the animal. 
Near Karlstadt the mistress of the family merely strikes it with a cross to 
produce the same effect. 

Among the Transylvanian Hungarian gypsies there is a magical 
ceremony performed on Saint George's Day, traces of which may be 
found in England. Then the girls bake a peculiar kind of cake, in 
which certain herbs are mixed, and which Dr. von Wlislocki declares 
has an agreeable taste. This is divided among friends and foes, and it 
is believed to have the property of reconciling the bitterest enemies and 
of increasing the love of friends, But it is most efficient as a love-charm, 
especially when given by women to men. The following gypsy song 
commemorates a deed of this kind by a husband, who recurred to it with, 
joy:— 



144 GYPSY SORCERY. 

" Kasave romfii na jidel, 
Ke kasavo maro the del; 
Sar m're gule lele pekel 
Kana Svato Gordye avel. 

"Furmuntel bute luludya 
Furmuntel yoy bute charma 
Andre petrel but kamabe 
Ko chal robo avla bake." 

" No one bakes such bread as my wife, such as she baked me on St. George's 
Day. Many flowers and dew were kneaded into the cake with love. Whoever eats 
of it will be her slave." 

In England I was told by an old gypsy woman named Lizzie 
Buckland, that in the old time gypsy girls made a peculiar kind of 
cake, a Romany morriclo, which they baked especially for their lovers, and 
used to throw to them over the hedge by night. To make it more 
acceptable, and probably to facilitate the action of the charm, they would 
put money into the cake. It was observed of old among the Romans 
that fascinatio began with flattery, compliments, and presents ! 

On the night of Saint John the witch climbs to the top of the hurdle 
fence which surrounds the cow-yard, and sings the following spell : — 

" K meni sir, 
K meni maslo, 
K meni puter, 
K meni mleko 
Avam pak kravsku kozu ! " 

" To me the cheese, 
To me the tallow (or meat), 
To me the butter, 
To me the milk, 
To you only the cowhide." 

Or, as it may be expressed in rhyme : — 

"The cheese, meat, butter, and milk for me, 
But only the cowhide left for thee." 



THE RENDEZVOUS OR MEETINGS OF WITCHES. 145 

Then the cow will die, the carcass be buried, and the skin sold. 
To prevent all this the owner goes early on St. John's Day to the 
meadow and gathers the morning dew in a cloak. This he carries home, 
and after binding the cow to a beam washes her with it. She is then 
milked, and it is believed that if all has gone right she will yield four 
bucketsful. 

In the chapter on " Conjurations and Exorcisms among the Hungarian 
Gypsies," J have mentioned the importance which they attach to the being 
born a seventh or twelfth child. This is the same throughout South 
Slavonia, where the belief that such persons in a series of births are ex- 
ceptionally gifted is shared by both gypsies, with whom it probably 
originated, and the peasants. What renders this almost certain is that 
Dr. Krauss mentions that the oldest information as to the subject among 
the Slavs dates only from 1854, while the faith is ancient among the 
gypsies. He refers here to the so-called Kerstniki, who on the eve of 
St. John do battle with the witches. Krstnik is a Greek word, meaning, 
literally, one who has been baptized. But the Krstnik proper is the 
youngest of twelve brothers, all sons of the same father. There appears 
to be some confusion and uncertainty among the Slavs as to whether all 
the twelve brothers or only the twelfth are ' c Krstnik " — according to the 
gypsy faith it would be the latter. These "twelvers" are the great pro- 
tectors of the world from witchcraft. 1 But they are in great danger on 
Saint John's Eve, for then the witches, having most power, assail them 
with sticks and stakes, or stumps of saplings, for which reason it is 
usual in the autumn to carefully remove everything of the kind from 
the ground. 

A krstnik is described by Miklosic as " Clovek kterega vile obljubiju" 
— " A man who has won the love of a Vila." The Vila ladies, or a cer- 

1 In Northern Sagas it appeared that Berserkers, or desperate warriors, frequently- 
bound themselves together in companies of twelve. Vide the Hervor Saga, Olaf 
Tryggvason's and the Gautrek Saga. So there were the twelve Norse gods and the 
twelve apostles. 



146 GYPSY SORCERY. 

tain class of them, are extremely desirous of contracting the closest 
intimacy — in short, of becoming the mistresses, of superior men. The 
reader may find numerous anecdotes of such amours in the ct Curiosa " of 
Heinrich Kornmann, 1666, and in my "Egyptian Sketch Book" (Trlibner 
& Co., London, 1874). In the heathen days, as at present among 
all gypsies and Orientals, it was believed to be a wonderfully lucky thing 
for a man to get the love of one of these beautiful beings. What the 
difficulties were which kept them from finding lovers is not very clear, 
unless it were that the latter must be twelfth sons, or, what is far more 
difficult to find, young men who would not gossip about their super- 
natural sweethearts to other mortals, who would remain true to them, 
and who finally would implicitly obey all their commands and follow 
their advice. There is a vast array of tales — Gypsy, Arab, Provencal, 
Norman, German, and Scandinavian, which show that on these points 
the Vila, or forest-maiden, or spirit of earth or air, or fairy, was abso- 
lutely exacting and implacable, being herself probably allowed by occult 
laws to contract an intimacy only with men of a high order, or such as 
are — 

" Few in a heap and very hard to find." 

On the other hand, the Vila yearns intensely for men and their near 
company, because there is about those who have been baptized a certain 
perfume or odour of sanctity, and as the unfortunate nymph is not im- 
mortal herself, she likes to get even an association or sniff of it from 
those who are. According to the Rosicrucian Mythology, as set forth 
in the " Undine " of La Motte Fouou£, she may acquire a soul by 
marrying a man who will be faithful to her — which accounts for the fact 
that so few Undines live for ever. However this may be, it appears 
that the Krstniki are specially favoured, and frequently invited by the 
Vilas to step in — generally to a hollow tree — and make a call. The 
hollow tree proves to be a door to Fairyland, and the call a residence 
of seven days, which on returning home the caller finds were seven years, 
for— 

"When we are pleasantly employed, time flies." 



THE RENDEZVOUS OR MEETINGS OF WITCHES. 147 

These spirits have one point in common with their gypsy friends — 
they steal children — with this difference, that the Vila only takes those 
which have been baptized, while the gypsy— at present, at least — is pro- 
bably not particular in this respect. But I have very little doubt that 
originally one motive, and perhaps the only one which induced these 
thefts, was the desire of the gypsies, as heathens and sorcerers, to have 
among them, " for luck," a child which had received the initiation into 
that mysterious religion from which they were excluded, and which, as 
many of their charms and spells prove, they really regarded as a higher 
magic. It is on this ground only, or for this sole reason, that we can 
comprehend many of the child-stealings effected by gypsies ; for it is 
absolutely true that, very often when they have large families of their 
own, they will, for no apparent cause whatever, neither for the sake of 
plunder, profit, or revenge, adopt or steal some poor child and bring it 
up, kindly enough after their rough fashion ; and in doing this they are 
influenced, as I firmly believe, far more by a superstitious feeling of 
bak, or luck, and the desire to have a Mascot in the tent, than any other. 
That children have been robbed or stolen for revenge does not in the 
least disprove what I believe — that in most cases the motive for the deed 
is simply superstition. 

On the eve of Saint George old women cut thistle-twigs and bring them 
to the door of the stall. This is only another form of the nettle which enters 
so largely into the Hungarian gypsy incantations, and they also make crosses 
with cowdung on the doors. This is directly of Indian origin, and points 
to gypsy tradition. Others drive large nails into the doors — also a curious 
relic of a widely-spread ancient custom, of which a trace may be found in 
the Vienna Stock im Eisen, or trunk driven full of nails by wandering appren- 
tices, which may be seen near the church of Saint Stephen. But the thistle- 
twigs are still held to be by far the most efficacious. In Vinica, or near it, 
these twigs are cut before sunset. They are laid separately in many places, 
but are especially placed in garlands on the necks of cattle. If a witch, in 
spite of these precautions, contrives to get into the stable, all will go wrong 
with the beasts during the coming year. 



148 GYPSY SORCERY, 

Now there was once a man who would have none of this thistle work — 
nay, he mocked at those who believed in it. So it came to pass that all 
through the year witches came every night and milked his cows. And he 
reflected, " I must find out who does this ! " So he hid himself in the hay 
and kept sharp watch. All at once, about eleven o'clock, there came in a 
milk-pail, which moved of its own accord, and the cows began to let 
down their milk into it. The farmer sprang out and kicked it over. Then 
it changed into a tremendous toad which turned to attack him, so that in 
terror he took refuge in his house. That proved to be a lucky thing for him. 
A week after came the day of Saint George. Then he hung thistle-twigs 
on his stable door, and after that his cows gave milk in plenty. 

Witches may be seen on Saint George's Day, and that unseen by them if 
a man will do as follows : He must rise before the sun, turn all his clothes 
inside out and then put them on. Then he must cut a green turf and place 
it on his head. Thus he becomes invisible, for the witches believe he is 
under the earth, being themselves apparently bewitched by this. 

Very early on the day of Saint George, or before sunrise, the witches 
climb into the church belfry to get the grease from the axle on which the bell 
swings, and a piece of the bell-rope, for these things are essential to them. 
Dr. Krauss observes that in the MS. from which he took this, schmierfetet 
or axle-grease, is indicated by the word svierc, " in which one at once recog- 
nizes the German word Schwartz, a black." It is remarkable that the 
Chippeway and other Algonkin Indians attach particular value to the 
black dye made from the grease of the axle of a grindstone. 

The extraordinary pains which they took to obtain this had attracted the 
attention of a man in Minnesota, who told me of it. It required a whole 
day to obtain a very little of it. The Indians, when asked by curious white 
people what this was for, said it was for dyeing baskets, but, as my informant 
observed, the quantity obtained was utterly inadequate to any such purpose,, 
and even better black dyes {e.g., hickory bark and alum) are known to, and 
can be very easily obtained by, them. The real object was to use the grease 
in " medicine," i.e., for sorcery. The eagerness of both witches in Europe 



THE RENDEZVOUS OR MEETINGS OF WITCHES. 149 

and Indians in America to obtain such a singular substance is very strange. 
However, the idea must be a recent one among the Indians, for there 
certainly no grindstones among them before the coming of the white men 



were 



" For all that I can tell, said he, 
Is that it is a mystery." 

Heathens though they be, many gypsies have a superstitious belief in 
the efficacy of the sacramental bread and wine, and there are many instances 
of their stealing them for magical purposes. So in the Middle Ages witches 
and sorcerers used these objects for the most singular purposes, Paulus 
Grillandus, in his " Tractatus de Hereticis et Sortilegiis," &c. (Lyons, 1547), 
assuring his readers that he had known a witch who had two holy wafers 
inscribed with magical characters which she used for debauching innocent 
girls and betraying them to men, and that it was a belief that if a woman 
had the sacred oil fresh on her lips no man could refrain from kissing her. 
This is the union of two kinds of magic ; a view which never once 
occurred to theological writers. And here I may appropriately mention 
that while the proofs of this work were passing through my hands 
accident threw into my way an extremely rare work, which illustrates 
to perfection the identity of popular and ecclesiastical sorcery. This is 
entitled " De EfFectibus Magicis, ac de Nuce Maga Beneventana," " Six 
Books of Magic Effects and of the Witch Walnut - tree of Benevento. 
A work necessary, joyous, and useful to Astrologists, Philosophers, 
Physicians, Exorcists, and Doctors, and Students of Holy Scriptures. By 
the Chief Physician, Peter Piperno." It appears to have been privately 
printed at Naples in 1647, and came from a conventual library. It bore, 
written on a fly-leaf, the word Proibito. 

In it every kind of disorder or disease is declared to be caused by 
devils and witches. The author believes with Delrio that disease entered 
into the world as a consequence of sin {referenda sit ad prima nostrce 
matris ■peccatuni) — a view held by John Milton ; hence, of course, all 
disease is caused solely by the devil. In his volume of two hundred 



159 GYPSY SORCERY. 

large and close pages, our Peter Piperno displays a vast erudition on 
the origin of devils and diseases, is bitter on the rival school of magical 
practitioners who use cures and incantations unlike his own, and then 
gives us the name and nature of all diseases, according to the different 
parts of the body, &c, the medical prescriptions proper for them, and 
what is, in his opinion, most needful of all, the incantation or exorcism 
to be pronounced. Sometimes there are several of these, as one for 
making up a pill, another on taking it, &c. There are also general 
conjurations — I mean benedictions — for the medicines altogether or in par- 
ticular, such as the Benedictio Syruporum, " The Blessing of the Syrups," 
and there is a very affecting and appropriately moving one for making 
or taking Castor Oil, and oils of all kinds, as follows : — 

"Benedictio Olei. 

" This begins with the In nomine Patris, &c, and Ai'jutorium nostrum, &c, and then : 
" I exorcise you all aromatics, herbs, roots, seeds, stones, gums, and whatever is to be 
compounded with this oil, by God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, by the 
God triune yet one, by the holy and single Trinity, that the impure Spirit depart from you, 
and with it every incursion of Satan, every fraud of the Enemy, every evil of the Devil, 
and that mixed with oil you may free the subject from all infirmities, incantations, bindings, 
witchcrafts, from all diabolical fraud, art, and power, by the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ 
and the most beloved Virgin Mary, and of all the saints. Amen." 

The curses for the devils of colds, fevers, rheumatisms, gouts, stomach- 
aches, &c, are awful, both in number, length, and quality ; enough to 
frighten a cowboy or " exhort an impenitent mule " into docility. There 
is the Exorcismus terribilis, or " Terrible Exorcism " of Saint Zeno, in 
which the disorder is addressed literally as " A dirty, false, heretical, 
drunken, lewd, proud, envious, deceitful, vile, swindling, stupid devil " — 
with some twenty more epithets which, if applied in these our days to the 
devil himself, would ground an action for libel and bring heavy damages 
in any court. It is to be remarked that in many prescriptions the author adds 
to legitimate remedies, ingredients which are simply taken from' popular 
necromancy, or witchcraft, as for instance, rue — fugce dcemonum — verbena, 



THE RENDEZVOUS OR MEETINGS OF WITCHES. 151 

and artemisia, all of which are still in use in Tuscany against sorcery and 
the evil eye. 

The really magical character of these exorcisms is shown by the 
vast array of strange words used in them, many of which have a common 
source with those used by sorcerers of the Cabalistic or Agrippa school, 
such as Agla, Tetragrammaton, Adonai, Fons, Origo, Serpens, Avis, Leo, 
Imago, Sol, Floy, Vitis, Mons, Lapis, Angularis, Ischyros, Pantheon, all of 
which are old heathen terms of incantation. These are called in the 
exorcism "words by virtue of which" — per virtutem istorum verborum — the 
devils are invited to depart. The whole is as much a work of sorcery as 
any ever inscribed in a catalogue of occulta, and it was as a specimen of 
occulta that I bought it. 





CHAPTER X. 

OF THE HAUNTS, HOMES, AND HABITS OF WITCHES IN THE SOUTH SLAVIC 
LANDS. BOGEYS AND HUMBUGS. 



RE witches 
in Slavonian 
gipsy - lore 
have now and 
then parties 
/ which meet 
to spin, al- 
jj_ ways by 
full moon- 
light on a 
cross-road. 
But it is 
not advis- 
<C, able, says 
Krauss, to 
pass by on 
such occa- 
' ^-<^~- -* sions, as the 

least they do to the heedless wayfarer is to bewitch and sink him into a deep 




THE HAUNTS, HOMES, AND HABITS OF WITCHES. 



i53 



sleep. But they are particularly fond of assembling socially in the tops of 
trees, especially of the ash, walnut, and linden or lime kinds, preferring th 
whose branches grow in the manner here depicted. 



ose 




It is but a few days ago, as I write, that I observed all along the route 
from Padua to Florence thousands of trees supporting vines, which trees had 
been trained to take this form, the farmers being as much influenced by 
" luck " in so doing as utility ; for it is not really essential that the tree 
shall so exactly receive this shape, to hold a vine, as is proved by the fact 
that there are plantations here and there where this method of training the 
trees is not observed. It is very suggestive of the tried a or trident of Siva, 
which originated the trushul, or cross of the gypsies. As regards the 
properties of the ash tree Krauss remarks that " roots with magic power 
grew under ash trees," and quotes a song of a maiden who, having learned 
that her lover is untrue, replies : — 

" Ima trava u okolo Save, 
I korenja okolo jasenja," 

" There are herbs by the Save, 
And roots around ash trees," 

— meaning that she can prepare a love-potion from these. There is in the 
Edda a passage in which we are also told that there are magic powers in 
the roots of trees, the reference being probably to the ash, and possibly to 
the alraun, or images made of its roots, which are sometimes misnamed 
mandrakes. 



154 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Other resorts of Slavonian gypsy witches are near or in deep woods and 
ravines, also on dung-hills, or places where ashes, lye, or rubbish is thrown, 
or among dense bushes. Or as soon as the sun sets they assemble in 
orchards of plum trees, or among ancient ruins, while on summer nights 
they hold their revels in barns, old hollow trees, by dark hedges or in sub- 
terranean caverns. The peasants greatly dread dung-hills after dark, for fear 
of cruel treatment by them. When a wild wind is blowing the witches love 
dearly to dance. Then they whirl about in eddying figures and capers, and 
when the sweat falls from them woe to the man who treads upon it ! — for he 
will become at once dumb or lame, and may be called lucky should he escape 
with only an inflammation of the lungs. In fact, if a man even walks in a 
place where witches have been he will become bewildered or mad, and remain 
so till driven homeward by hunger. But such places may generally be recog- 
nized by their footprints in the sand ; for witches have only four toes — the 
great toe being wanting. These mysterious four toe-tracks, which are indeed 
often seen, are supposed by unbelievers to be made by wild geese, swans, or 
wild ducks, but in reply to this the peasant or gypsy declares that witches 
often take the form of such fowl. And there is, moreover, much Rabbinical 
tradition which proves that the devil and his friends have feet like peacocks, 
which are notoriously birds of evil omen, as is set forth by a contributor to 
The St. James s Gazette, November 16, 1888 : — 

" Again, take peacocks. Nobody who has not gone exhaustively into the subject can 
have any adequate idea of the amount of general inconvenience diffused by a peacock. 
Broken hearts, broken limbs, pecuniary reverses, and various forms of infectious disease have 
all been traced to the presence of a peacock, or even a peacock feather, on the premises." 

The evil reputation of the peacock is due to his having been the only 
creature who was induced to show Satan the way into Paradise. (For a poem 
on this subject, vide " Legends of the Birds," by C. G. Leland, Philadelphia, 
1864). 

If any one should by chance pop in — like Tarn O'Shanter — to an assembly 
of witches, he must at once quickly cover his head, make the sign of the 
cross, take three steps backwards and a fourth forwards. Then the witches 



THE HAUNTS, HOMES, AND HABITS OF WITCHES. 155 

cannot injure him. Should a gentleman in London or Brighton abruptly 
intrude into a five o'clock tea, while Peel or Primrose witches are discussing 
some specially racy scandal, he should, however, make instantly so many steps 
backwards as will take him to his overcoat or cane, and then, after a turn, so 
many down-stairs as will bring him into the street. 

If any man should take in his hand from the garden fence anything 
which a witch has laid there, he will in the same year fall sick, and if he 
has played with it he must die. There be land-witches and water-witches 
— whoever goes to swim in a place where these latter are found will 
drown and his body never be recovered. Sometimes in these places the 
water is very deep, but perfectly clear, in others it is still and very 
muddy, to which no one can come within seven paces because of an 
abominable and stifling vapour. And, moreover, as a dead cat is gene- 
rally seen swimming on the top of such pools, no one need be endangered 
by them. 

The fact that the gypsy and South Slavonian or Hungarian Folk- 
lore is directly derived from classic or Oriental sources is evident from 
the fact that the Shemitic-Persian devil, who is the head and body of all 
witchcraft in Western Europe, very seldom appears in that of the 
Eastern parts. The witches there seem invariably to derive their art 
from one another ; even in Venice they have no unusual fear of death 
or of a future state. A witch who has received the gift or power of 
sorcery cannot die till she transfers it to another, and this she often finds 
it difficult to do, as is illustrated by a story told me in Florence in 1886 
by the same girl to whom I have already referred. 

"There was a girl here in the city who became a witch against her will. And 
how ? She was ill in a hospital, and by her in a bed was una rccchia, ammalata grava- 
me?ite, e no?i poteva morirt — an old woman seriously ill, yet who could not die. And 
the old woman groaned and cried continually, ' Oitne ! muoio ! A chl lascib? non 
che! 'Alas! to whom shall I leave?'- — but she did not say what. Then the poor 
girl, thinking of course she meant property, said: l Las date a me — son tanto povera! 
('Leave it to me — I am so poor.') At once the old woman died, and ' La povtra 
giovana se e trovato in eredita della streg/:onen'a' — the poor girl found she had inherited 
witchcraft. 



156 GYPSY SORCERY. 

" Now the girl went home, where she lived with her brother and mother. And 
having become a witch she began to go out often by night, which the mother obser- 
ving, said to her son, ' Quale 7 e volta tu troverai tua sorella colla pancia grossa.' ('Some 
day you will find your sister with child.') 'Don't think such a thing, mamma,' he 
replied. ' However, I will find out where it is she- goes.' 

" So he watched, and one night he saw his sister go out of the door, sullo punto 
delta mezza notte — just at midnight. Then he caught her by the hair, and twisted it 
round his arm. She began to scream terribly, when — ecco! there came running a 
great number of cats — e co?ni?iciarono a miolare, e fare tin gran chiasso — they began to mew 
and make a great row, and for an hour the sister struggled to escape — but in vain, for 
her hair was fast — and screamed while the cats screeched, till it struck one, when the 
cats vanished and the sorella was insensible. But from that time she had no witch- 
craft in her, and became a buona donna, or good girl, as she had been before — ' come era 
prima.' " 

It is very evident that in this story there is no diabolical agency, and 
that the witchcraft is simply a quality which is transferred like a disease, 
and which may be removed. Thus in Venice— where, as is evident from 
the works of Bernoni, the witches are of Gypsy-Slavic-Greek origin — a 
witch loses all her power if made to shed even one drop of blood, or 
sometimes if she be defeated or found out to be a witch. In none of 
these countries has she received the horrible character of a mere instru- 
ment of a stupendous evil power, whese entire will and work is to damn 
all mankind (already full of original sin) to eternal torture. For this 
ne plus ultra of horror could only result from the Hebrew-Persian concep- 
tion of perfect malignity, incarnate as an anti-god, and be developed by 
gloomy ascetics who begrudged mankind every smile and every gleam of 
sunlight. In India and Eastern Europe the witch and demon are simply 
awful powers of nature, like thunder and pestilence, darkness and malaria, 
they nowhere appear as aiming at destroying the soul. For such an idea 
as this it required a theology and mythology emanating from the basis, 
of an absolutely perfect monotheos, which gave birth to an antithesis ; 
infinite good, when concentrated, naturally suggesting a shadow counter- 
part of evil. In Eastern Europe the witch is, indeed, still confused with 
the Vila, who was once, and often still is, a benevolent elementary spirit, 
who often punishes only the bad, and gladly favours the good. It is as. 



THE HAUNTS, HOMES, AND HABITS OF WITCHES. 157 

curious as it is interesting to see how, under the influence of the Church, 
everything which was not directly connected with the current theology 
was made to turn sour and bitter and poisonous, and how darkness and 
frost stole over flowery fields which once were gay in genial sunshine. 
It is a necessary result that in attaining higher ideals the lesser must fade 
or change. Devilism, or the dread of the child and savage of the powers 
of darkness and mysterious evil, ends by incarnating all that is painful 
or terrible in evil spirits, which suggest their opposites. From Devilism 
results Polytheism, with one leading and good spirit, who in time be- 
comes supreme. Then we have Monotheism. But as evil still exists, 
it is supposed that there are innately evil powers or spirits who oppose 
the good. By following the same process the leader of these becomes an 
anti-type, Lucifer, or Satan, or arch-devil, the result being Dualism. In 
this we have a spirit endowed with incredible activity and power, who is 
only not omnipotent, and whose malignity far transcends anything attri- 
buted to the gods or devils of Polytheism. His constant aim is to damn 
all mankind to all eternity, and his power is so great that to save even 
a small portion of mankind from this fate, God himself, or His own Son, 
must undergo penance as a man — an idea found in the Buddhism of 
India. This is all the regular and logical sequence of Fetishism and 
Shamanism. Witchcraft, and the tales told of it, follow in the path of 
the religion of the age. In the earliest time women were apparently the 
only physicians — that is to say magicians — and as man was in his lowest 
stage the magic was a vile witchcraft. Then came the Shaman — a man 
who taught in Animism a more refined sorcery, which was, however, 
as yet the only religion. But the witch still existed, and so she continued 
to exist, -pari -passu, through all the developments of religion. And to 
this day every form and phase of the magician and witch exist some- 
where, it sometimes happening that traces of the earliest and most bar- 
barous sorcery are plain and palpable in the most advanced faith. There 
may be changes of name and of association, but in simple truth it is all 
" magic " and nothing else. 



158 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Gypsy, Hungarian, Slavonian, Indian, and Italian witches, however 
they may differ from those of Western Europe on theological grounds, 
agree with them in meeting for the purposes of riotous dancing and de- 
bauchery. It has been observed that this kind of erotic dancing appears 
to have been cultivated in the East, and even in Europe, from the earliest 
times, by a class of women who, if not absolutely proved to be gypsies, 
had at any rate many points of resemblance with them. " The Syrian 
girl who haunts the taverns round," described by Virgil, suggests the 
Syrian and Egyptian dancer, who is evidently of Indo-Persian — that is to 
say of Nuri, or gypsy — origin. The Spanish dancing girls of remote 
antiquity have been conjectured to have come from this universal Hindoo 
Romany stock. I have seen many of the Almeh in Egypt — they all 
seemed to be gypsyish, and manv were absolutely of the Helebi, Nauar, 
or Rhagarin stocks. This is indeed not proved — that all the deliberately 
cultivated profligate dancing of the world is of Indo-Persian, or gypsy 
origin, but there is a great deal, a very great deal, which renders it 
probable. And it is remarkable that it occurred to Pierre Delancre 
that the Persian ballerine had much in common with witches. Now the 
dancers of India are said to have originated in ten thousand gypsies sent 
from Persia, and who were of such vagabond habits that they could not 
be persuaded to settle down anywhere. Of these Delancre says : — 

"The Persian girls dance at their sacrifices like witches at a Sabbat — that is naked — 
to the sound of an instrument. And the witches in their accursed assemblies are either 
entirely naked or en chemise, with a great cat clinging to their back, as many have at 
divers times confessed. The dame called Volt a is the commonest and the most indecent. 
It is believed that the devil taught three kinds of dances to the witches of Ginevra, and 
these dances were very wild and rude, since in them they employed switches and 
sticks, as do those who teach animals to dance. 

"And there was in this country a girl to whom the devil had given a rod of iron, 
which had the power to make any one dance who was touched with it. She ridiculed 
the judges during her trial, declaring they could not make her die, but they found a 
way to blunt her petulance. 

"The devils danced with the most beautiful witches, in the form of a he-goat, or 
of any other animal, and coupled with them, so that no married woman or maid ever 



THE HAUNTS, HOMES, AND HABITS OF WITCHES. 



59 



came back from these dances chaste as they had gone. They generally dance in a 
round, back to back, rarely a solo, or in pairs. 

"There are three kinds of witch-dances ; the first is the trescone alia Boema, or the 
Bohemian rigadoon " (perhaps the polka), "the second is like that of some of our work- 
people in the country, that is to say by always jumping" (this may be like the 
Tyrolese dances), "the third with the back turned, as in the second rigadoon, in which 
all are drawn up holding one another by the hand, and in a certain cadence hustling 
or bumping one another, deretano contro deretano. These dances arc to the sound of a 
tambourine, a flute, a violin, or of another instrument which is struck with a stick. 
Such is the only music of the Sabbat, and all witches assert that there are in the world 
no concerts so well executed." 

" A tambourine, a violin, a flute," with perhaps a zimbel, which is 
struck with a stick. Does not this describe to perfection gypsy music, and 
is not the whole a picture of the wildest gypsy dancing wherever found? 
Or it would apply to the Hindoo debauches, as still celebrated in honour 
of Sakktya, " the female principle " in India. In any case the suggestion 
is a very interesting one, since it leads to the query as to whether the 
entire sisterhood of ancient strolling, licentious dancers, whether Syrian, 
Spanish, or Egyptian, were not possibly of Indian-gypsy origin, and 
whether, in their character as fortune-tellers and sorceresses, they did not 
suggest the dances said to be familiar to the witches. 

Mr. David Ritchie, the editor, with Mr. Francis Groome, of the 
Journal of the Gypsy-Lore Society, has mentioned (vol. i. No. 2) that 
Klingsohr, a reputed author of the " Nibelungen Lied," was described 
as a " Zingar wizard " by Dietrich the Thuringian. Like Odin, this 
Klingsohr rode upon a wolf — a kind of steed much affected by witches 
and sorcerers. There is an old English rhyming romance in which a 
knight is represented as disguising himself as an Ethiopian minstrel. These 
and other stories — as, for instance, that of Sir Estmere — not only indicate 
a connection between the characters of minstrel and magician, but suggest 
that some kind of men from the far East first suggested the identity be- 
tween them. Of course there have been wild dancers and witches, and 
minstrel-sorcerers, or vates, prophet-poets, in all countries, but it may also 
be borne in mind that nowhere in history do we find the female erotic 



160 GYPSY SORCERY. 

dancer and fortune-teller, or witch, combined in such vast numbers as in 
India and Persia, and that these were, and are, what may be truly called 
gypsies. Forming from prehistoric times a caste, or distinct class, it is 
very probable that they roamed from India to Spain, possibly here and 
there all over Europe. The extraordinary diplomatic skill, energy, and 
geographic knowledge displayed by the first band of gypsies who, about 
141 7, succeeded in rapidly obtaining permits for their people to wander in 
every country in Europe except England, indicate great unity of plan and 
purpose. That these gypsies, as supposed sorcerers, appearing in every 
country in Europe, should not have influenced and coloured in some way 
the conceptions of witchcraft seems to be incredible. If a superstitious 
man had never before in his life thought of witches dancing to the devil's 
music, it might occur to him when looking on at some of the performances 
of Spanish and Syrian gypsy women, and if the man had previously been 
informed — as everybody was in the fifteenth century or later — that these 
women were all witches and sorceresses, it could hardly fail to occur to 
him that it was after this fashion that the sisters danced at the Sabbat. 
Of which opinion all that can be said is, that if not proved it is extremely 
possible, and may be at least probed and looked into by those of the 
learned who are desirous of clearly establishing all the grounds and origins 
of ancient religious beliefs and superstitions, in which pies it may be 
found that witches and gypsies have had fingers to a far greater extent 
than grave historians have ever imagined. 

The English gypsies believe in witches, among their own people, and 
it is very remarkable that in such cases at least as I have heard of, they 
do not regard them as dmes damnees or special limbs of Satan, but rather 
as some kinds of exceptionally gifted sorceresses or magicians. They are, 
however, feared from their supposed power to make mischief. Such a 
witch may be known by her hair, which is straight for three or four 
inches and then begins to curl — like a waterfall which conies down smoothly 
and then rebounds roundly on the rocks. It may be here remarked that 
all this gypsy conception of the witch is distinctly Hindoo and not in 



THE HAUNTS, HOMES, AND HABITS OF WITCHES. 161 

the least European or of Christians, with whom she is simply a human 
devil utterly given over to the devil's desires. And it is very remarkable 
that even the English gypsies do not associate such erring sisters — or any 
other kind — with the devil, as is done by their more cultivated associates. 

The witch, in gypsy as in other lore, is a haunting terror of the 
night. It has not, that I am aware, ever been conjectured that the word 
Humbug is derived from the Norse hum, meaning night, or shadows 
(tenebrce) (Jon^o, " Icelandic Latin glossary in Niall's Saga "), and bog, 
or bogey, termed in several old editions of the Bible a bug, or " bugges." 
And as bogey came to mean a mere scarecrow, so the hum-bugges or 
nightly terrors became synonymes for feigned frights. ' C A humbug, a 
false alarm, a bug-bear" ("Dean Milles MS." Halliwell). The fact 
that bug is specially applied to a nocturnal apparition, renders the reason 
for the addition of hum very evident. 

There is a great deal that is curious in this word Bogey. Bug-a-boo 
is suggestive of the Slavonian Bog and Buh, both meaning God or a 
spirit. Boo or bo is a hobgoblin in Yorkshire, so called because it is said 
to be the first word which a ghost or one of his kind utters to a human 
being, to frighten him. Hence, " he cannot say bo to a goose." Hence 
boggart, bogle, boggle, bo-guest, i.e., bar-geist, boll, boman, and, probably 
allied, bock (Devon), fear. Bull-beggar is probably a form of bu and 
bogey or boge, allied to boll (Northern), an apparition. 




CHAPTER XI. 

GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. THE MAGICAL POWER WHICH IS INNATE IN ALL 

MEN AND WOMEN— HOW IT MAY BE CULTIVATED AND DEVELOPED 

THE PRINCIPLES OF FORTUNE-TELLING. 

OMEN excel in the 
manifestation of certain 
qualities which are as- 
sociated with mystery 
and suggestive of occult 
influences or power. 
Perhaps the reader will 
pardon me if I devote 
a few pages to what I 
conceive to be, to a 
certain degree, an ex- 
planation of this magic ; 
though, indeed, it may 
be justly said that in so doing we only pass the old boundary of " spiritual " 
sorcery to find ourselves in the wider wonderland of Science. 

Whether it be the action of a faculty, a correlative action of physical 




GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 163 

functions, or a separate soul in us, the fact is indisputable that when our 
ordinary waking consciousness or will goes to sleep or rest, or even dozes, 
that instant an entirely different power takes command of the myriad 
forces of memory, and proceeds to make them act, wheel, evolute, and 
perform dramatic tricks, such as the Common Sense of our daily life 
would never admit. This power we call the Dream, but it is more than 
that. It can do more than make Us, or Me, or the Waking Will, believe 
that we are passing through fantastic scenes. It can remember or revive 
the memory of things forgotten by us ; it can, when he is making no 
effort, solve for the geometrician problems which are far beyond his 
waking capacity — it sometimes teaches the musician airs such as he could 
not compose. That is to say, within ourself there dwells a more mysterious 
Me, in some respects a more gifted Self. There is not the least reason, 
in the present state of Science, to assume that this is either a " spiritual " 
being or an action of material forces. It puzzled Wig an as the dual 
action of the brain; and a great light is thrown on it by the " Physiology" 
of Carpenter and the "Memory" of David Kay (one of the most 
remarkable works of modern times), as well as in the " Psycho 
Therapeutics" of Dr. Tuckey. 

This power, therefore, knows things hidden from Me, and can do 
what I cannot. Let no one incautiously exclaim here that what this 
really means is, that I possess higher accomplishments which I do not use. 
The power often actually acts against Me — it plays at fast and loose 
with me — it tries to deceive me, and when it finds that in dreams I 
have detected a blunder in the plot of the play which it is spinning, 
it brings the whole abruptly to an end with the convulsion of a night- 
mare, or by letting the curtain fall with a crash, and — scena est deserta — 
I am awake ! And then " how the phantoms flee — how the dreams 
depart ! " as Westwood writes. With what wonderful speed all is washed 
away clean from the blackboard ! Our waking visions do not fly like 
this. But— be it noted, for it is positively true— the evanescence of our 
dreams is, in a vast majority of instances, exactly in proportion to their folly. 



1 64 GYPSY SORCERY. 

I am coming to my witchcraft directly, but I pray you have patience 
with my proeme. I wish to narrate a dream which I had a few years 
ago (September 5, 1887), which had an intensity of reality. Dreams, 
you know, reader, vary from rainbow mist to London fog, and so on 
to clouds, or mud. This one was hard as marble in comparison to most. 
A few days previously I had written a letter to a friend, in which I had 
discussed this subject of the dual-Me, and it seemed as if the Dream were 
called forth by it in answer. 

I thought I was in my bed — a German one, for I was in Homburg 
vor der Hohe — yet I did not know exactly where I was. I at once perceived 
the anomaly, and was in great distress to know whether I was awake 
or in a dream. I seemed to be an invalid. I realized, or knew, that 
in another bed near mine was a nurse or attendant. I begged her to 
tell me if I were dreaming, and to awake me if I were. She tried 
to persuade me that I was in my ordinary life, awake. I was not at all 
satisfied. I arose and went into the street. There I met with two or 
three common men. I felt great hesitation in addressing them on such 
a singular subject, but told them that I was in distress because I feared 
that I was in a dream, and begged them to shake or squeeze my arm. 
I forget whether they complied, but I went on and met three gentlemen, 
to whom I made the same request. One at once promptly declared that 
he remembered me, saying that we had met before in Cincinnatti. He 
pressed my arm, but it had no effect. I began to believe that I was 
really awake. I returned to the room. I heard a child speaking or 
murmuring by the nurse. I asked her again to shake my hand. This 
she did so forcibly that I was now perfectly convinced that it was no 
dream. And the instant it came home to me that it was a reality, there 
seized me the thrill or feeling as of a coming nightmare — and I 
awoke ! 

Reviewing my dream when awake, I had the deepest feeling of 
having been joue or played with by a master-mocker. I recalled that, 
when I rose in my night-robe from the bed, I did not dress — and yet found 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 165 

myself fully dressed when in the street. Then I remembered that when 
I returned to America, in 1879, I was in great apprehension lest I should 
have trouble and delay with our sixteen trunks, because there was under 
my charge a lady who was dying. To my great relief and amazement, 
the officer whose duty it was to search claimed me as an old acquaintance, 
who had met me and T. Buchanan Read, the poet, in Cincinnati in 
1864. But what impressed me most of all, at once, was that the whole 
was caused by, and was a keen and subtle mockery of my comments in 
my letter, of the other Ego, and of its sarcastic power. For I had been led, 
step by step, through the extremest doubt, to a full conviction of being awake, 
and then dismissed, as it were, with a snap or sneer into wakefulness itself ! 

Now this Dream Artist is, to judge by his works, a very different kind 
of a person from Me. We are not sympathetic, and herein lies a great and 
serious subject of study. " Dreams," says a writer, " are the novels which 
we read when we are fast asleep," and, at the risk of receiving punishment, I 
declare that my writer belongs to a school of novelists with which I have no 
feelings in common. If, as everybody assumes, it is always /who dream — only 
using other material — how is it that I always invariably disagree with, thwart, 
contradict, vex, and mock myself? I had rather be hanged and be done with 
it, before I would wrong my worst enemy with such pitiful, silly, degrading 
dreams and long-forgotten follies, as I am called on to endure. If this 
alter-ego were a lunatic, he could not be a more thoroughly uncongenial 
inmate of my brain than he often is. Our characters are radically different. 
Why 'has he a mind so utterly unlike mine ? His tastes, his thoughts, 
dispositions, and petty peculiarities are all unlike mine. If we belonged to 
the same club, I should never talk with him. 

Now we are coming to our Witchcraft. This alter-ego does not confine 
himself to dreams. A lunatic is a man who dreams wide-awake. He has lost 
his will or the controlling power resulting from the just co-relation of brain 
forces. Then the stored-up images stray out and blend. I have dreamed 
of telling or seeing things and of acting them at the same time. A fish and 
a watch and a man may seem to be the same thing at once in a dream, as 



1 66 GYPSY SORCERY. 

they often are to a waking lunatic. A poet is a man who dreams wide- 
awake ; but he can guide his dreams or imaginings to symmetrical form, and 
to a logical conclusion or coherence. With the painter and sculptor it is the 
same. When the alter-ego works harmoniously with the waking will, we 
call it Imagination. 

But when the alter-ego draws decidedly on latent forces, or powers 
unknown to the waking Me, I am amazed. He does it often enough, that 
is certain. Then we have Mystery. And it is out of this that men have 
drawn the conclusion that they have two or three souls — an astral spirit, a 
power of prophecy, the art of leaving the body, and the entire machinery of 
occultism. Physiology is probably on the high road to explain it all, but as 
yet it is not explained. 

Meanwhile it steals into our waking life in many ways. It comes in 
.emotions, presentiments, harp tones, mystical conceptions, and minglings of 
images or ideas, and incomprehensible deductions, which are sometimes, of 
course, prophetic. It has nothing in common with common sense ; therefore 
it is to some un-common sense, or to others non-sense. Sometimes it is one 
or the other. Agreeable sensations and their harmony become the Beautiful. 
These blend and produce a general aesthetic sense. It becomes mystical, and 
is easily worked on by the alter-ego. The most inspired passages of every 
poet on the beauty of Nature betray clearly the influence and hidden power 
of the Dream in waking life. Shelley, Wordsworth, Keats, Byron, 
were all waking dreamers de la -premiere force. 

He who has heard an iEolian harp play — and I have heard the seven 
of Justinus Kerner in the old castle of Weibertreu when I was his guest — 
if he be a " tone-artist," has often caught series of chords which were almost 
melodies. This music has the same relation to definite composition which 
the dream has to waking common sense. There are two things which I do 
not understand. One is, why composers of music make so little use of the 
suggestive iEolian harp ; the second is, why decorative designers never employ 
the folding mirror I to produce designs. The one is an exact counterpart of 
1 Vide "Drawing and Designing." London : Whittaker & Co., 1888. 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. i6 r 

the other, and both are capable of revealing inexhaustible harmonies, for both 
are deeply in accordance with the evolving processes of Nature. 

The poetic or artistic faculty is, we therefore assume, the action on the 
myriad cells of memory by a strange — sometimes apparently involuntary — 
fantastic power, which is at the same time higher and lower than common 
sense or waking consciousness. Every image which man has received from 
sensation lies stored away in a cell, and is, in fact, a memory by itself. There 
is a faculty of association or sympathy by which groups of these images are 
called up, and there is perception which receives them, more or less vividly, 
like a photographic plate. When awake, Will, or coherent Common Sense, 
regulates all this machinery. When asleep, the Images seem to steal out and 
blend and frisk about by themselves in quaint dances, guided apparently by 
a kind of power whom I have conventionally called the alter-ego. This 
power throws open brain or memory-cells, which waking Common Sense has 
forgotten ; in their chaotic or fantastic searches and mingling they produce 
poetry ; they may chance on prophecy, for if our waking self had at 
command the immense latent knowledge in which these elves revel, it would 
detect sequences and know to what many things would lead, now unto us all 
unknown. 

I once knew a nobleman who inherited in Italy a palace which he had 
never seen. There were in it three hundred rooms, and it had belonged to a 
family which had for six hundred years collected and handed down to their 
descendants every kind of object, as if they had been magpies or ravens. 
The heir, as a grave, earnest man, only concerned himself with the armoury 
and picture gallery and principal rooms. But his young daughter Bertha 
ranged all over the place and made hundreds of the most singular discoveries. 
One day she came to me very much delighted. She had found an obscure 
room or garret, in which there were ranged about on shelves, " sitting up and 
all looking at her," several hundred old dolls and marionettes. For two 
hundred years or more the family had kept its old dolls. In this case the 
father was the waking reason, the rooms the brain cells, and Bertha the 
sprite who ranges over all and knows where to find forgotten images in 



168 GYPSY SORCERY. 

store. Many of those whom we meet in dreams are like the ghosts of 
dolls. 

This is the only true Night side of Nature, but its shadows and dusky 
twilight, and strangely-hued chiaroscuros and long pauses of gloom, come 
constantly into the sunlight of our waking life. Some lives have too much 
of it, some too little. Some receive it in coarse and evil forms, as lunatics, 
and sufferers from mania a potu ; some canny people — happy Scotchmen, for 
instance — succeed in banishing it from life as nearly as is possible for a human 
being to do. Now to speak clearly, and to recapitulate distinctly, I set forth 
the following propositions : — 

I. We have a conscious will which, whether it be an independent 
incomprehensible spirit, or simply the correlative result or action of all our 
other brain powers, exists, and during our waking hours directs our thoughts 
and acts. While it is at work in the world with social influences, its general 
tendency is towards average common sense. 

II. This conscious will sleeps when we sleep. But the collective images 
which form memory, each being indeed a separate memory, as an aggregate 
of bees' cells form a comb, are always ready to come forth, just as honey is 
always sweet, limpid, and fluid. There is between them all an associative 
faculty, or a strange and singular power, which begins to act when the will 
sleeps. Whether it be also an independent Self which plays capriciously 
while conscious will sleeps, or a result of correlated forces, it is not as yet 
possible to determine. What we know is, that it calls forth the images by 
association, and in a fantastic, capricious manner, imitates and combines what 
we have experienced, or read, or thought, during our waking hours. 

III. Our waking will can only realize or act on such images as it has 
kept familiarly before it, or such as have been so often recalled that they 
recur spontaneously. But all the treasures of memory seem to be available 
to the dream ruler, and with them a loose facile power of grouping them 
into kaleidoscopic combinations. Thus, if one could imagine a kaleidoscope 
which at every turn made varied groups of human or other figures in different 
attitudes, with changing scenery ; and then suppose this to be turned round 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 169 

by some simple vital or mechanical action, he would have an idea of the 
action of dreams. It is probable that the radical function of the dream- 
power is to prevent images from becoming utterly forgotten or rusty ; and 
by exercising the faculty of facile or chance combination to keep awake in 
man originality and creativeness. For it is almost certain that, but for the 
intrusion of this faculty into our waking thoughts, man would become a mere 
animal, without an idea beyond the joint common appetites, instincts, and 
emotions of the lowest of his kind. 

IV. The dream-power intrudes more or less into all waking life. Then 
it acts, though irregularly, yet in harmony, with conscious will. When it is 
powerful and has great skill in forming associations of images — and by 
images I mean, with Kay, " ideas " — and can also submit these to waking 
wisdom, the result is poetry or art. In recalling strange, beautiful images, 
and in imagining scenes, we partly lapse into dreaming ; in fact, we do dream, 
though conscious will sits by us all the time and even aids our work. And 
most poets and artists, and many inventors, will testify that, while imagining 
or inventing, they abstract the " mind " from the world and common-place 
events, seek calm and quiet, and try to get into a " brown study," which is 
a waking dream. That is to say, a condition which is in some respects 
analogous to sleep is necessary to stimulate the flow and combination of 
images. This brown study is a state of mind in which images flow and 
blend and form new shapes far more easily than when Will and Reason have 
the upper hand. For they act only in a conventional beaten track, and deal 
only with the known and familiar. 

V. Magic is the production of that which is not measured by the 
capacity of the conscious working will. The dream spirit, or that which 
knows all our memories, and which combines, blends, separates, scatters, 
unites, confuses, intensifies, beautifies, or makes terrible all the persons, 
scenes, acts, events, tragedies, or comedies known to us, can, if it pleases, 
by instantaneous reasoning or intuition, perceive what waking common sense 
does not. We visit a sick man, and the dream spirit, out of the inexhaustible 
hoards of memory aided by association, which results in subtle, occult 

23 



170 GYPSY SORCERY. 

reasoning, perceives that the patient will die in a certain time, and this 

result is served up in a dramatic dream. The amount of miracles, mysteries, 

apparitions, omens, and theurgia which the action of these latent faculties cause y 

or seem to cause, is simply illimitable, for no man knows how much he 

knows. Few, indeed, are the ordinary well-educated Europeans of average 

experience of life, whose memories are not inexhaustible encyclopaedias, and 

whose intellects are not infinite ; if all that is really in them could be wakened 

from slumber, "know thyself" would mean "know the universe." Now, 

there are people who, without being able to say why, are often inspired by 

this power which intuitively divines or guesses without revealing the process 

to common sense. They look into the eye of a person — something in glances 

and tones, gestures, mien, and address, suggests at once an assertion or a 

prediction which proves to be true. Considering that the dream-power has 

millions of experiences or images at its command, that it flits over them all 

like lightning, that it can combine, abstract, compare, and deduct, that it 

being, so to speak, more of a thaumaturgical artist than anything else, excels 

waking wisdom in subtle trickery, the wonder is, not that we so often hear of 

marvellous, magical, inexplicable wonders, but that they are not of daily or 

hourly occurrence. When we think of what we might be if we could 

master ourselves, and call on the vast sea of knowledge which is in the brain 

of every one who reads these lines, to give strict reckoning of its every wave 

and every drop of water, and every shell, pebble, wreck, weed, or grain of 

sand over which it rolls, and withal master the forces which make its tides 

and storms, then we may comprehend that all the wonder-working power 

attributed to all the sorcerers of olden time was nothing compared to what 

we really have within us. 

It is awful, it is mysterious, it is terrible to learn this tremendous truth 
that we are indeed within ourselves magicians gifted with infinite intellectual 
power — which means the ability to know and do all things. In the past 
men surmised the existence of this infinite memory, this power of subtle 
research and combination, but between them and the truth in every land 
and time interposed the idea of objective spiritual or supernatural 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 171 

existences whose aid or medium was necessary to attain to wisdom. 
Outside of us was always Somebody Else to be invoked, conciliated, met 
in vision or trance, united to in spiritual unity or syncope. Sometimes 
they hit upon some form of hypnotism or mesmerism, opiates or forced 
swoons and convulsions, and so extorted from the nerves and dream- 
power some of their secrets which were all duly attributed to the " spirits." 
But in the whole range of occult literature from Hermes Trismegistus 
down to Madame Blavatsky there is not a shade of a suspicion that 
all the absolutely authentic marvels of magic began and ended with man 
himself. 

Least of all did any speculator yet conjecture how to set forth on 
the path which leads us to this wonderland. For there is a way to it, 
and a power to master the infinite stores of memory and render the 
dream-power a willing servant, if we take the pains to do it. Firstly — 
as may be found asserted, and I think fairly proved, in my work on 
" Practical Education," and in the " Memory of David Kay " (London, 
1888)— every child by a very easy gradual process, simply that of learning 
by heart, and reviewing, can develope its memory to such a degree 
that all which that child reads, hears, or sees can be literally retained for 
life. Secondly, quickness of perception, which is allied to memory, can be 
taught so as to develope intuitive observation and intelligence to an 
equally incredible extent. Thirdly — and for this I have had abundant 
personal experience — every child can learn Design and the Minor Arts or 
develope the Constructive faculties, and by doing this alone a pupil 
becomes exceptionally clever in all studies. The proof of this is that 
the 200 pupils who attended an industrial or art school in Philadelphia 
took precedence in studies among 110,000 others in the public schools. 

If all the stores of our memory were distinctly cognized by our 
waking will when they first came into our possession, we should have the 
first great element of power beyond all our present dreams of greatness. 
That this can be done has been recognized by many of the most advanced 
thinkers of the day. If a child be trained to exercise quickness of per- 



I72 GYPSY SORCERY. 

ception so that at last it observes and remembers everything — and 
experiment has proved this also — it will make the Dream Power a waking 
power absolutely in harmony and accordance with waking wisdom or 
conscious will. For the reason why the capricious, wild, strange fitful 
faculty has always remained foreign to us, is because in all our culture 
we have never sought to subdue and train the powers allied to it. 
Catch and tame one water-fairy, says the Red Indian legend, and you 
may get all her sisters. Waking quickness of perception is a wonderful 
ability. It can be trained to flit like lightning over illimitable fields of 
thought (supplied by a vast memory), and with them it spontaneously 
developes comparison and deduction. Now all of this is marvellously akin 
to the habitual action of the dream power plus that of reflection. And 
it is not possible to conceive that with waking quickness of perception, 
or voluntary subtlety of thought, cultivated in infancy to the highest 
power, its twin which sports in sleep should not feel its influence and 
act under it. 

The result of this culture would inevitably be that the marvels, 
mysteries, and magic as they seem to us of the dream, or intuitive power, 
would be perfectly under our waking control, or to such an extent that 
we could secure all that is profitable in them. It is a very curious fact 
that while Reflection or Waking Wisdom slumbers, Quickness of Percep- 
tion or Perception and Association seem to be always awake — in dreams or 
waking. A very extended series of observations has convinced me that the 
acquisition of a very great degree of Observation itself, or of Attention, is as 
possible as to learn French, and no harder; yet as a branch of study it 
literally does not exist. As a writer in the New York Tribune remarks : 
" In fact, observation is almost an atrophied faculty, and when a writer 
practises it for the purposes of his art, we regard the matter as in some 
sense wonderful." Interest, as Maudsley has shown, is a natural result 
of Attention, and the two generate Will. Whether we can actually 
control the Dream-power is not as yet proved by experiment. All that 
we can say is that it is probable. But that this power manifests itself in 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 173 

waking hours when it submits to Reflection, is an established fact. It 
shows itself in all imagination, in all originality, brave art or " fantasy." 
Therefore it is no extravagant deduction to conclude that all of its action 
which now seems so wonderful, and which has furnished the ground-work 
for what we call magic, is perfectly within our grasp, and may be 
secured by simple methods of training which require only perseverance 
to perfect them. 

The gypsy fortune-teller is accustomed for years to look keenly 
and earnestly into the eyes of those whom she dukkers or " fortune- 
tells." She is accustomed to make ignorant and credulous or imaginative 
girls feel that her mysterious insight penetrates "with a power and 
with a sign " to their very souls. As she looks into their palms, and 
still more keenly into their eyes, while conversing volubly with perfect 
self-possession, ere long she observes that she has made a hit — has 
chanced upon some true passage or relation to the girl's life. This 
emboldens her. Unconsciously the Dream Spirit, or the Alter-Ego, is 
awakened. It calls forth from the hidden stores of Memory strange 
facts and associations, and with it arises the latent and often uncon- 
scious quickness of Perception, and the gypsy actually apprehends and 
utters things which are " wonderful." There is no clairvoyance, illumina- 
tion or witchcraft in such cases. If such powers existed as they are 
generally understood to do, we should for one case of curious prediction 
hear of twenty thousand. But the Dream-power is at best fitful, irregular 
and fantastic in its action ; it is at all times untrustworthy, for it has never 
been trained unless of yore by Chaldasan priests and magi. In some 
wonderful way facts do, however, manifest themselves, evoked out of the 
unknown by "occult," though purely material, mental faculties; and the 
result is that wonder at the inexplicable — which makes miracles — until we 
are accustomed to them. 

That gypsy women often do surmise or arrive at very curious and 
startling truths I know by my own experience, and also know that 
I myself when reading character in people's hands according to the laws 



174 GYPSY SORCERY. 

laid down in books on chiromancy, when I have felt deeply interested, 
or as one may say excited or inspired, and have gone a little beyond 
mere description into conjecture and deduction, have been amazed 
at my own successes. It happened once that when in company with 
several ladies it was proposed after lunch to go to a gypsy camp on 
the Thames, and have fortunes told. Among these ladies was one of 
a very imaginative temperament, who had not only lived many years in 
the East, but had resided several winters as a guest in Arab families. As 
she was very much disappointed at not finding the gypsies, I offered to tell 
her fortune by onomancy, i.e., by taking the letters of her name according 
to numbers, and deducing from them her past and future. This I did in 
a most reckless manner, freely setting down whatever came into my 
mind. It seems to me now that a kind of inspiration suggested what 
I wrote and predicted. What was my amazement to hear the lady declare 
that all which had been written as to her past life was literally true, and 
I saw that she was simply awed at my supposed power of prediction, 
and had the fullest faith in what I had declared as regarded the future. 
What I had intended for a jest or mere entertainment turned out to 
be serious enough. And reflecting on the evil consequences of such 
belief on a person who naturally attributed it all to magic, I deeply 
regretted what I had done, and have not since attempted any renewal 
of such oracle-work. It had previously occurred that I wrote out such 
a prediction for another lady which I did not clearly explain to her, 
but in which there was a regular recurrence and repetition of some- 
thing unfortunate. This was shown in after years, and the troubles all 
came to pass as I had written. Now the more I studied this case 
the more I was convinced that it was based on unconscious observation, 
comparison, and deduction. Fichte has said that no bird can fly 
beyond itself, but the mind sometimes does actually precede its own 
conscious reasoning and throw back facts to it. 

It may be urged by those who still cling to the old-fashioned fetish of a 
distinction between Spirit and Matter, that this explanation of predictions, 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 175 

oracles, and insight, is simply materialistic and utterly destructive of all the 
poetry, grandeur, and beauty which is associated with mysterious divination. 
But for those who believe with Maudsley, et sui generis, that all such 
distinctions are not seriously worth considering, and to him who can rise 
to the great philosophy now dawning on the world, there is perceptible in it 
something far more wonderful and poetical, beautiful and even awful, than 
ever was known to any occultist of old — for it is scientific and true. It is 
also true that man can now talk across the world and hear all sounds 
conveyed to him through the depths of ocean. He can catch these sounds 
and keep them for centuries. How long will it be before sights, scents, and 
tastes will be thus transferred, and the man sitting in London will see all 
things passing in Asia, or wherever it pleases him or an agent to turn a mirror 
on a view ? It will be. 1 Or how long before the discovery of cheap and 
perfect aerial navigation will change all society and annihilate national dis- 
tinctions ? That, too, will be. These and a thousand stranger discoveries 
will during the ensuing century burst upon the world, changing it utterly. 
We go on as of old in our little petty narrow grooves, declaring that 
this will be, and that will never come to pass, and that this or that kind 
of hop-scotch lines, and tip-cat and marbles rules, are the eternal laws 
of humanity, and lo ! all the while in his study some man whom you 
regard as a dreamer or dolt is preparing that which will be felt 
forever . 

One of these great discoveries, and that not the least, will be the develop- 
ment and mastery of memory and perception, attention, interest, and will in 
children, with the constructive faculty which stimulates the whole by means 
of easy gradual series of instructions. When this system shall be perfected, 
we shall advance to understanding, controlling, and disciplining the subtler 
and stranger powers of the brain, which now puzzle us as dreams, intuitions, 
poetic inspiration, and prophecy. But this prophecy comes not from it, nor 
from any vague guessing or hoping. It is based on facts and on years of 
careful study of a thousand children's minds, and from a conviction derived 
1 This was written long before I heard that the same idea had occurred to others. 



i 7 6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

from calm observation, that the powers of the human mind are infinite and 
capable of being developed by science. And they will be ! 

There is very little knowledge among gypsies of real chiromancy, such 
as is set forth in the literature of occult or semi-occult science. Two 
centuries ago, when chiromancy was studied seriously and thoroughly by 
learned and wise men, the latter compared thousands of hands, and naturally 
enough evolved certain truths, such as you, reader, would probably evolve for 
yourself if you would do the same. Firstly they observed, as you may do, 
that the hand of a boor is not marked like that of a gentleman, nor that of 
an ignoramus like the palm of an artist or scholar. The line which indicates 
brain is on an average shorter in women than in men ; in almost every instance 
certain signs infallibly indicate great sensuality, Others show a disposition to 
dreaminess, sentimentalism, the occult. Now as Love, Wisdom, Strength of 
Will, or Inertness^ are associable with Venus, Apollo, Jupiter, or Saturn, and 
as astrology was then seriously believed in, it came to pass that the signs of 
chiromancy were distributed to the seven planets, and supposed to be under 
their dominion. It was an error, but after all it amounts to a mere 
classification. Properly considered, the names Jupiter, Saturn, Apollo, 
Mercury, Venus, and Mars are only synonymes of qualities, meaning 
masculine virtue and character, aptitude, art, cleverness, sexual passion, and 
combativeness. He who would, without a trace of superstition, analyze and 
describe many hands compared with the characters of their owners, would 
adopt effectively the same arrangement. 

When we remember the age in which they lived and the popular 
yearning for wonders and marvels which then characterized even the wisest 
men, the old chiromancers were singularly free from superstition. There 
were many among them who would have regarded with supreme contempt a 
Desbarolles, with his fortune-telling for twenty francs. 

To these truly honest men, the gypsies, with their pretended chiromancy, 
were at first a great puzzle. The learned Pr^etorius, in his vast work on 
Chiromancy and Physiognomy, devotes seventy-five pages to this ' c foreign 
.element in our midst," and comes to the conclusion that they are humbugs. 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 177 

They do not know the lines — they know nothing. The intrusion of the 
latent powers of the mind had no place in the philosophy of Pr^etorius, 
therefore he did not perceive the back door by which the Romany slipped 
into the oracle. Yet there is abundant evidence even in his own valuable 
collection of the works of his predecessors, that many of them when tempted 
from merely describing character to straying into prophecy, were guided by 
something more mysterious than the laws of the lines of life, of the head, 
heart, the circle of Venus, the " hepatic," and via lactea. The Hungarian 
gypsies have a system of chiromancy of their own which the reader may find 
in the book tc Vom Wandernden Zigeunervolke," by Dr. von Wlislocki, 
Hamburg, 1890, I had translated this and more of the kind for this chapter, 
tut omitted it, thinking, firstly, that its place is supplied by more important 
matter ; and, secondly, because it is, save as perhaps indicative of Indian 
•origin, quite valueless, being merely of the prophetic kind. 

I have more than once known gypsies to tell me things of my past life 
which were certainly remarkable, bewildering, or inexplicable. And for the 
ordinary seeker of " voonders oopon voonders " it is all-sufficient that a thing 
:shall be beyond clear intelligence. " How do you explain that ? " is their 
crucial question, and their cry of triumph when relating some case of an 
.authentic apparition, a spiritual feat of thaumaturgy, or a dream fulfilled. In 
fact they would rather not have it explained. I well remember how Professor 
Joseph Henry, when lecturing on natural science, narrated to us, his hearers, 
how when he told certain people how certain tricks of a common conjuror 
were executed, they all protested that it could not be the way it was 
•done. They did not wish to be disillusioned. Raise a man from the 
dead, make him fly through the air, and it is for everybody a miracle. 
Give them the power to do the same, and in a month's time it will be 
no longer miraculous, but something "in the due course of nature." And 
what single fact is there in the due course of nature which is not as 
inexplicable if we seek for a full explanation of it ? Consider this thing 
every day till you are penetrated with it, bear it in mind constantly, and in 
due time all phenomena will be miracles. We can apparently get a little 

24 



i 7 8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

nearer to the causes and give our discoveries names, but the primal causes as 
constantly recede and are continually buried in deeper mystery. But with 
most people names pass for explanations. 

" Can you tell me what a hypothesis is ? " asked a young gentleman 
at a dinner party of a friend who passed for being well-informed. " Hush," 
was the reply. " Not now — ladies present." 

" Mon caporal" asked a French soldier, " can you tell me what is 
meant by an equilateral?" "Certainly — mats dabord — do you know 
Hebrew ? " " No." " Ah, then it would be impossible to explain it to 
you." 

"What is it that makes people's heads ache?" inquired an old 
lady of a youth who had just begun his medical studies. " Oh, it is 
only the convolution of the anomalies of the ellipsoid," replied the 
student. " Just see now what it is to git larnin ! " commented the dame. 
" He knows it all in a straight line ? " 

The one is satisfied that a hypothesis is something improper, the 
other that an equilateral is a matter which he might understand if he 
were as learned as his corporal, and the third is pleased to find that the 
mystery has at least a name. And human beings are satisfied in the 
same way as to the mysteries of Nature. Give them a name and assure 
them that the learned understand it, and they are satisfied. 

It is a fundamental principle of human folly to assume that any 
alleged marvel is a "violation of the laws of Nature," or the work of 
supernatural influences, until it is proved not to be such. Nature cannot 
be violated. She is ever virgin. And " how do you account for that ? '" 
is always assumed to be a test question. It cannot be denied that in 
almost every case, the narrator assumes the absolute truth of all which 
he states, when, as is well known, even in the most commonplace 
incidents of ordinary life, such truth can very rarely be obtained. 
Secondly, he assumes that all the persons who were cognizant of the 
miracle, or were concerned in it, were not only perfectly truthful, but 
endowed with perfect perfections, and absolutely sound judgments. If 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. i 79 

there is the least shadow of a possibility that one of them could have 
erred in the least particular, the whole must fall to the ground as a proof 
or test — for we must have irrefragible and complete evidence before we 
adopt a faith on which all our life may depend. But, thirdly, by 
asking any one to account for a marvel, he assumes that the one thus 
called on knows everything short of the supernatural or Infinite, which 
is simply silly. 

But there is a higher source of admiration and wonder than could 
ever be established by vulgar fetish, Animism, or supernaturalism, and this 
is to be found in the mysteries of Nature which man has never pene- 
trated, and which, as soon as they are overcome, reveal others far grander 
or deeper. Thus as Alps rise beyond Alps, and seas of stars and solar 
systems spread in proportions of compound multiplication, our powers of 
vision increase. And it often happens to him who looks deeply into 
causes, that one of the myriad test cases of so-called " supernaturalism," 
when it has ignominiously broken down — as all do sooner or later — often 
reveals a deeper marvel or mystery than it was intended to support. 
Thus some Red Indians in North America, on being told how certain 
juggling tricks which they had accepted for magic were performed, calmly 
replied that it did not make the least difference — that a man must have 
been a magician (or divinely inspired) to be able to find out such tricks. 
And I myself knew an Indian trader named Ross, who, being once among 
a wild tribe, put on a mask of -papier mache, which caused tremendous 
excitement and awe, which was not in the least diminished when he took 
it off and put it into their hands and explained its nature, for they 
maintained that the thing which could cause such terror indicated the 
existence of superior mental power, or magic, in the maker. In which 
there is, as it seems to me, indications of a much higher wisdom or 
sagacity than is to be found in the vulgar spiritualist who takes the event 
or thing itself for the miracle, and who, when found out in his tricks, 
ignominiously collapses. 

The conclusion from all this is, that I have seen and heard of much 



i8o GYPSY SORCERY. 

in gypsy witchcraft and fortune-telling which, while it was directly allied to 
humbug of the shallowest kind, also rested on, or was inspired by, mental 
action or power which, in our present state of knowledge, must be 
regarded as strangely mysterious and of the deepest interest. And this 
is indeed weird, in the fullest and truest sense, since it is used for 
prophecy. I will now endeavour to illustrate this. 

It is but natural that there should be "something in" gypsy fortune- 
telling. If the reader were to tell ten fortunes a day for twenty years 
it would be very remarkable indeed if in that time he had not learned 
some things which would seem wonderful to the world. He would detect 
at a glance the credulous, timid, bold, doubtful, refined or vulgar nature, 
just as a lawyer learns to detect character by cross-examination. Many 
experiments of late years have gone very far to establish the existence of 
a power of divining or reading thought ; how this is really done I know 
not ; perhaps the experts in it are as ignorant as I am, but it is very 
certain that certain minds, in some (as yet) marvellous way, betray their 
secrets to the master. That there are really gypsies who have a very 
highly cultivated faculty of reading the mind by the eye is certainly true. 
Sometimes they seem to be themselves uncertain, and see as through a 
glass darkly, and will reveal remarkable facts doubtfully. I remember 
a curious illustration of this. Once I was walking near Bath, and 
meeting a tinker asked him if there were any gypsies in the vicinity. 
He gave me the address of a woman who lived in a cottage at no great 
distance. I found it with some trouble, and was astonished on entering 
at the abominably miserable, reckless, squalid appearance of everything. 
There was a half or quarter-bred gypsy woman, ragged, dirty, and drunk, 
a swarm of miserable children, and a few articles of furniture misplaced 
or upset as if the inmates had really no idea of how a room should 
be lived in. I addressed the woman civilly, but she was too vulgar and 
degraded to be capable of sensible or civil conversation with a superior. 
Such people actually exist among the worst class of vagabonds. But as 
I, disgusted, was about to leave, and gave her a small gratuity, she offered 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 181 

to tell my fortune, which I declined, whereupon she cried, " You shall 
see that I know something ; " and certainly told me something which 
astonished me, of an event which had taken place two years before at a great 
distance. To test her I coolly denied it all, at which she seemed astonished 
and bewildered, saying, " Can I have made a mistake ? You are certainly 
the person." All of this may be explained by causes which I shall set forth. 
But it cannot be too earnestly insisted on to people who habitually doubt, 
that because a thing can be explained in a certain way (i.e., by humbug) 
that it necessarily follows that that is the only explanation of it. Yet this 
is at the present day actually and positively the popular method, and it 
obtains very largely indeed with the small critics of the " safe school." 
Mrs. Million has diamonds ; she may have stolen them — a great many 
people have stolen diamonds — therefore she is probably a thief. The 
Icelandic sagas describe journies to America ; but the writers of the 
sagas were often mythical, exaggerative, and inaccurate — therefore all they 
narrate as regards America must be, of course, untrue. 



Jack Stripe 
Eats tripe, 

It is therefore credible 
That tripe is edible ; 
And it follows perforce, 
As a matter of course, 
That the devil will gripe 
All who do not eat tripe. 



But I do not insist that there is anything "miraculous" in gypsy 
fortune-telling. It may be merely the result of great practical experience 
and of a developed intuition, it may be mind or "thought-reading"— 
whatever that really is— or it may result from following certain regular 
rules. This latter method will be pronounced pure humbug, but of that 
I will speak anon. These rules followed by anybody, even the feeblest 
dilettante who has only read Desbarolles for drawing-room enter- 



1 82 GYPSY SORCERY. 

tainment, will often astonish the dupe. They are, " in few," as 
follows : — 

1. It is safe in most cases with middle-aged men to declare that they have had 
a law-suit, or a great dispute as to property, which has given them a great deal of 
trouble. This must be impressively uttered. Emphasis and sinking the voice are of great 
assistance in fortune-telling. If the subject betray the least emotion, or admit it, 
promptly improve the occasion, express sympathy, and "work it up." 

2. Declare that a great fortune, or something greatly to the advantage of the subject, 
or something which will gratify him, will soon come in his way, but that he must be 
keen to watch his opportunity and be bold and energetic. 

3. He will have three great chances, or fortunes, in his life. If you know that he has 
inherited or made a fortune, or had a good appointment, you may say that he has 
already realized one of them. This seldom fails. 

4. A lady of great wealth and beauty, who is of singularly sympathetic disposition, 
is in love with him, or ready to be, and it will depend on himself to secure his happi- 
ness. Or he will soon meet such a person when he shall least expect it. 

5. " You had at one time great trouble with your relations (or friends). They 
treated you very unkindly." Or, " They were prepared to do so, but your resolute conduct 
daunted them." 

6. " You have been three times in great danger of death." Pronounce this very 
impressively. Everybody, though it be a schoolboy believes, or likes to believe, that he 
has encountered perils. This is infallible, or at least it takes in most people. If the 
subject can be induced to relate his hairbreadth escapes, you may foretell future perils. 

7. "You have had an enemy who has caused you great trouble. But he — or she — 
jt is well not to specify which till you find out the sex — will ere long go too far, and 
his or her effort to injure you will recoil on him or her." Or, briefly, " It is written 
that some one, by trying to wrong you, will incur terrible retribution." Or, " You have 
had enemies, but they are all destined to come to grief." Or, "You had an enemy but 
you outlived him." 

8. " You got yourself once into great trouble by doing a good act." 

9. " Your passions have thrice got you into great trouble. Once your inconsiderate 
anger (or pursuit of pleasure) involved you in great suffering which, in the end, was to 
your advantage." Or else, "This will come to pass; therefore be on your guard." 

10. "You will soon meet with a person who will have a great influence on your 
future life if you cultivate his friendship. You will ere long meet some one who will 
fall in love with you, if encouraged." 

11. "You will find something very valuable if you keep your eyes open and watch 
closely. You have twice passed over a treasure and missed it, but you will have a third 
opportunity." 

12. "You have done a great deal of good, or made the fortune or prosperity of 
persons who have been very ungrateful." 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 183 

13. "You have been involved in several love affairs, but your conduct in all was 
really perfectly blameless." 

14. "You have great capacity for something, and before long an occasion will 
present itself for you to exert it to your advantage." 

By putting these points adroitly, and varying or combining them, 
startling cases of conviction may be made. Yet even into this deception 
will glide intuition, or the inexplicable insight to character, and the deceiver 
himself be led to marvel, so true is it that he who flies from Brama o-oes 
towards him, let him do what he will, for Truth is everywhere, and even 
lies lead to it. 

The reader has often seen in London Italian women who have small 
birds, generally parrakeets, or paraquitos, which will for a penny pick out 
for her or for him slips of paper on which is printed a " fortune." If he 
will invest his pence in these he will in most instances find that they " fit 
his case" exactly, because they are framed on these or other rules, 
which are of very general application. There was, in 1882, an Italian 
named Toricelli. Whether he was a descendant of the great natural 
philosopher of the same name who discovered the law of the vacuum I do 
not know, but he certainly exhibited — generally in Piccadilly- — -an ingenious 
application of it. He had a long glass cylinder, filled with water, in which 
there was a blown glass image of an imp. By pressing his hand on the 
top of the cover of the tube the folletto or diavoletto was made to rise or 
fall — from which the prediction was drawn. It will hardly be believed, but 
the unfortunate Toricelli was actually arrested by the police and punished 
for " fortune-telling." l After this he took to trained canaries or parrakeets, 
which picked out printed fortunes, for a living. Whether the stern arm 
of British justice descended on him for this latter -form of sorcery and 
crime I do not know. 

" Forsc fu dal demonio trasportato, 
Fiancheggiandosi del' autorita 
Di Origcne o di San Girolamo." 



1 Another Italian was fined or imprisoned for the same thing in London in July, 1S90- 
for telling penny fortunes by the same machine. 



j 84 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Now it may be admitted that to form such rules (and there are many- 
more far more ingenious and generally applicable) and to put them into 
practice with tact, adapting them to intuitions of character, not only as seen 
in the face but as heard in the voice or betrayed by gestures and dress and 
manner, must in the end develop a power. And, further still, this power 
by frequent practice enables its possessor to perform feats which are really 
marvellous and perhaps inexplicable, as yet, to men of science. I have, I 
think, indicated the road by which they travel to produce this result, but 
to what they arrived I do not know. 

Nor do they all get there. What genius is, physiology, with all the 
vast flood of light spread by Francis Galton on hereditary gifts, cannot 
as yet explain. It is an absolute thing of itself, and a "miracle." Some- 
times this wonderful power of prediction and of reading thought and quickly 
finding and applying rules falls into the hands of a genius. Then all our 
explanations of " humbug " and " trickery " and juggling fall to the ground, 
because he or she works what are absolutely as much miracles as if the 
artist had raised the dead. Such geniuses are the prophets of old ; sometimes 
they are poets. There are as many clearly- defined and admirable predictions 
as to events in art and politics in the works of Heine, which were fulfilled, 
as can be found anywhere. 

By the constant application of such rules, promptly and aptly, or boldly, 
the fortune-teller acquires a very singular quickness of perception. There 
are very few persons living who really know what this means and to what 
apparently marvellous results constant practice in it may lead. Beginning 
with very simple and merely mechanical exercises (" Practical Education," 
p. 151. London: Whittaker & Co.), perception may be gradually deve- 
loped until not only the eye and ear observe a thousand things which escape 
ordinary observation, and also many " images " at once, but finally the mind 
notes innumerable traits of character which would have once escaped it, 
combines these, and in a second draws conclusions which would amuse 
those who are ignorant — as indeed all men are as yet — of the extraordinary 
faculties latent in every man. 



GYPSY WITCHCRAFT. 



185 



I beg the reader to pay special attention to this fact. There is nothing 
in all the annals of prophecy, divination, fortune-telling, or prediction, which 
is nearly so wonderful as what we may all do if we would by practice and 
exercise bring out of ourselves our own innate power of perception. This 
is not an assertion based on metaphysical theory ; it is founded on fact, 
and is in strict accordance with the soundest conclusions of modern phy- 
siology. By means of it, joined to exercises in memorizing, all that there 
is in a child of ordinary intellect may be unerringly drawn out ; and when in 
due time knowledge or information is gradually adduced, there is perhaps no 
limit to what that intellect may become. The study, therefore, of quickness 
of perception, as set forth or exercised in gypsy fortune-telling, is indeed 
curious ; but to the far-reaching observer who is interested in education it 
is infinitely more useful, for it furnishes proof of the ability latent in every 
mind to perform what appear to be more than feats of intelligence or miracles, 
yet which often are all mere trifles compared to what man could effect if he 
were properly trained to it. 

Sorcery ! We are all sorcerers, and live in a wonderland of marvel 
and beauty if we did but know it. For the seed sprouting from the 
ground is as strange a truth as though we saw the hosts of heaven sweeping 
onward in glory, or could commune with fairies, or raise from his grave 
the master magician of song who laid a curse on all who should dig his 
dust. But like children who go to sleep in the grand opera, and are wild 
with delight at Punch, we turn aside from the endless miracle of nature 
to be charmed and bewildered with the petty thaumaturgy of guitars in the 
dark, cigarettes, and rope-tying, because it corresponds to and is miracle 
enough for us. And perhaps it is as well ; for much thought on the 
Infinites made Jean Paul Richter and Thomas Carlyle half mad and 
almost unfit for common life. Seek truth in Science and we shall be well 
balanced in the little as well as the great. 



2 5 




CHAPTER XII. 

FORTUNE-TELLING {continued). ROMANCE BASED ON CHANCE, OR HOPE, 

AS REGARDS THE FUTURE FOLK- AND SORCERY-LORE AUTHENTIC 

INSTANCES OF GYPSY PREDICTION. 



T would seem to all who now live that life would 
be really intolerably dry were it utterly deprived 
of mystery, marvel, or romance. This latter 
is the sentiment of hopeful chance allied to 
the beautiful. Youth is willing or eager to 
run great risks if the road to or through 
them passes by dark ravines, under castled 

rocks — 

" o'er dewy grass 
And waters wild and fleet " 

— and ever has been from the beginning. 
:^~ Now, it is a matter of serious importance 
to know whether this romance is so deeply 
inherent in man that it can never be removed. 
5Si ^~ For, rightly viewed, it means current religion, 
— -" poetry, and almost all art — as art at least 
was once understood — and it would seem as 
if we had come, or are coming, to a time when science threatens to deprive 




FOR TUNE- TELLING. 1 8 7 

us of it all. Such is the hidden fear of many a priest and poet — it may be 
worth while to consider whether it is all to pass away into earnest prose 
or assume new conditions. Has the world been hitherto a child, or a 
youth, were poetry and supernaturalism its toys, and has the time come 
when it is to put away childish things ? 

We can only argue from what we are, and what we clearly know or 
understand. And we know that there are in Nature, though measured 
by the senses alone, phenomena which awake delightful or terrible, sub- 
lime or beautiful, grave or gay feelings, or emotions, which inspire 
corresponding thoughts. There is for us " an elf-home glory-land," 
far over setting suns, mysterious beauty in night and stars in their eternal 
course, grandeur of God in the ocean, loveliness in woman, chiaroscuro in 
vapoury valleys and the spray of waterfalls by moonlight, exciting emotions 
which are certainly not within the domain of science — as yet — and which 
it is impossible for us, as we are at present constituted, to imagine as 
regarded entirely from the standpoint of chemical and physical analysis. 
To see in all this — as we are — only hydro-carbons, oxygen, silex and 
aluminium, atoms, molecules, and " laws " — that is to say, always the parts 
and combinations and no sense as regards man that he is, with his 
emotional sense of beauty, anywhere in the game or of any account — is 
going far too far. Setting teleology and theology entirely aside, Man, 
as the highest organism, has a right to claim that, as the highest faculties 
which have been as yet developed in him were caused by natural 
phenomena, therefore there is in the phenomena a certain beamy which 
is far more likely to lead to more advanced enjoyment of form, colour, 
or what we call the aesthetic sense, than to shrink away and disappear. 
And it seems to me that the most extended consideration of science leads 
to the result or conclusion that under its influence we shall find that the 
chemical and physical analyses of which I have spoken are only the dry 
A B C of a marvellously grand literature, or of a Romance and Poetry 
and Beauty — perhaps even of a wondrous " occult " philosophy, of 
whose beginning even we have, as yet, no idea. 



1 88 GYPSY SORCERY. 

But, great as it may be, those who will make it must derive their 
summary of facts or bases of [observation from the past, and therefore 
I urge the importance of every man who can write doing what he can to 
collect all that illustrates Humanity as it is and as it was in by-gone ages. 
It hath not entered into the heart of man to conceive what a Folk-lore 
or ethnological society in ancient Greece, Rome, or Egypt might not have 
collected and preserved for the delight of every civilized human being 
of the present day. It is very true that the number of persons, as yet, 
who understand this— still less of those who take a real interest in it — is 
extremely limited, and they do not extend in England, America, or any 
other country, to more than a few hundreds. To the vast multitude, even 
of learned men, Folk-lore is only a c ' craze " for small literary bric-a-brac, a 
"fancy" which will have its run, and nothing more. To its earnest devotees 
it is the last great development of the art of learning and writing history, 
and a timely provision for future social science. It sets forth the most 
intimate inner life of people as they were, and the origins of our life as it is. 
In Folk-lore, Philology, Ethnology, and the study of Mythology or Religion 
find their greatest aid. 

The amount of Red Indian Folk-lore which has been suffered to perish 
in the United States without exciting the least interest is beyond all belief. 
Thoreau could find in the Algonkin legends of New England nothing 
but matter for feeble-minded ridicule. But there are men coming, or 
a generation rising, to whom every record of the past will be of value, for 
they are beginning to perceive that while the collector is doing work of 
value the mere theorist, who generally undervalues if he does not actually 
oppose the collector, will with his rubbish be swept away " down the 
back-entry of time," to be utterly forgotten. 

Gypsy sorcery-lore is of great value because all over the Aryan world 
gypsies have in ancient or modern times been, so to speak, the wandering 
priests of that form of popular religion which consists of a faith in fortune- 
telling. This is really a very important part in every cult ; the most 
remarkable thing connected with it ; as with charms, fetishes, incantations 



FORTUNE-TELLING. 189 

and protective spells, being the extraordinary success with which the more 
respectable magi have succeeded in convincing their followers that their 
own sorcery was not " magic " at all, and that the world-old heathen 
rites, which are substantially the same, are mere modern thieveries from 
the " established religion." Prediction and prophecy were the corner- 
stones of the classic mythology and of the Jewish law ; they were equally 
dear to the Celtic races, and all men seem from the earliest times to have 
believed that coming events cast their shadows before. How this began 
and grew requires no deep study. Many disorders are prefaced by uneasy 
dreams or unaccountable melancholy, even as the greatest disaster which 
befel the gods of Valhalla was preceded by the troubled dreams of 
Balder. Sometimes the first symptom of gout is a previous irritability. 
But if diseases are believed to be caused by the literal occupation of the 
body by evil spirits these presages will be ascribed to occult spiritual 
influences. A man in excellent health feels gay — he goes hunting and 
has luck — of course his guardian spirit is believed to have inspired h m 
to go. Then comes the priest or the gypsy to predict, and the h ts 
are recorded and the misses are promptly forgotten. 

The following instance has been related to me in good faith by a 
learned friend, whose books are well known to all Folk-lorists : — 

"I can quote from my own experience a strange event founded on a prediction 
made to me by a gypsy in 1863. This was before I had learned the language of the 
Romany or had begun to take any interest in them. At the time of which I speak, 

I met one day here, in T , one or two gypsy women bearing as usual babies on their 

shoulders, when the oldest as I was passing by pointed me out to the bystanders, saying 
in German, ' Der Herr hat viel Kummcr gehait' ('That gentleman has had much 
trouble ' — or sorrow). 

" This was true enough, as I was suffering greatly at the time from a previous 
bereavement, though I was no longer in mourning, nor was there at the instant any 
indication of gloom in my looks, for I was in a cheerful humour. So I stopped to ask 
her why she had made her remark. She replied, ' Ja, gcben Sic mir die linke Hand una 
legeti Sie drei Silbermunze darauf, wenn Sic weiteres horen toollen ' (' Yes, give mc your 
hand, and put three silver coins on it, if you would hear more'). I did so, when 
she repeated her assertion as to my sorrow, and added, ' Aber cine Graffiti tteht fiir Ihitif 
('But there is a countess awaiting you'). 



190 .GYPSY SORCERY. 

" I laughed at myself for listening to this, and for the strange feeling of interest or 
faith which I felt in it, and which my common sense told me was ridiculous. And 
yet the prediction, strangely enough, was fulfilled, though not in the sense in which I 
suppose most people would have taken it. Soon after I lost another relative, and was 
overwhelmed with that and other troubles when Providence sent me a friend in that 

most amiable and remarkable woman the Countess B , who, with that noble and 

gracious affability which distinguishes her, as well as her husband, Sir , relieved my 

mind and cheered my depressed spirits. 

" I add to this a marvellous story of a gypsy prediction which was uttered here in 

T and published last year in a small biography, but which is worth consideration 

because I have heard it apparently well authenticated by trustworthy people. A 
very great disgrace to our town — 1 am happy to say he was the only one — was a Mr. 

M , of very good family. This man kept a mistress named R. M , who became 

acquainted with a young man who was employed as a clerk at the Credit Ajistalt, and who 

always at night carried on his person its keys. This M learned, and formed the 

following plot : The victim was to be enticed by the woman to her room, where she 

proposed to cut his throat, take the keys, and with the aid of M to rob the bank 

and escape. It succeeded so far as that the young man was brought to her room, but 
when she began to attempt to kill him he struggled, and was overpowering her when 
M — - — entered the room and shot him dead. 

" The precious pair were subsequently arrested and tried, and in the report of the 
proceedings there appears the following curious statement : — 

" ' It is a singular thing (cosa piu singolare) that to this woman (M 's mistress, 

Miss R ), a gypsy woman who pretended to palmistry predicted that she would 

come to a bad end (ctiessa finirebbe assai male).'' Which she effectually did, being con- 
demned to fourteen years' hard labour, and would have been hung had not her "interesting 
.state " inclined the judge to mercy. 

" There is the following addition in the pamphlet to what has been quoted : ' Being 

begged by the said Maria R to look more closely into the hand, the Zingara 

refused to do so, and went away muttering strange or foreign words.' (Borbottanda strane 
parole')" 

To this my informant adds : — 

"1 know of a more cheerful case of gypsy prediction, and of quite another kind, and 

which happened to a friend's friend of mine, also here in T . The 'subject' 

was a young lady, who was 'intended' or betrothed, to an Italian actor, who had gone 
to play at Madrid ; but for two months she heard nothing from him, and, believing 
that he had neglected her, was in despair. 

" One morning she was passing through one of the main streets, and was talking 
with my friend, when a dark gypsy girl going by, whispered to her in a hurried manner : 
* Domani avrai una lettera e sarai felice ' (' To-morrow you will receive a letter and be 



FORTUNE-TELLING. 191 

happy'). Having said this and nothing more, without asking for money, she went 
away. The promised letter was in fact received, all went well, and the lady is now 
married to the gentleman. This is all simply true. I leave the comments on the 
case to investigators. Can it be that gypsies arc sometimes clairvoyant?" 

My own comment on the case is that, admitting that the gypsy knew 
beforehand all the circumstances or even the " parties " in the affair, she 
had divined or "intuited" a result, and risked, as some might call it, 
or else uttered from a real conviction, her prophecy. How the mind, 
without any miracle — as miracles are commonly regarded — often arrives 
quite unconsciously to such conclusions, I have already considered in another 
chapter. Making every allowance for unconscious exaggeration and the 
accretive power of transmission, I am willing to believe that the story is 
actually true. 

The following is also perfectly authentic : An English lady of excellent 
family, meeting a gypsy, was told by the latter that in six months the 
most important event of her life would come to pass. At the end of the 
time she died. On her death-bed she said, " I thought the gypsy meant 
a marriage, but I feel that something far more important is coming, for 
death is the great end of life." 

The following was told me by a Hungarian gentleman of Szegedin : — 

" There was in Arad a lady who went to a ball. She had a necklace to which 
were attached four rings. During the evening she took this from her neck, and doubling 
it, wore it on her arm as a bracelet. In the house where she lived was a young gentleman 
who came to accompany her home from the ball. All at once, late at night, she missed 
her necklace and the rings, which were of great value. 

"The next day she sent for a gypsy woman, who, being consulted, declared that 
the collar had been stolen by some one who was very intimate in her house. Her 
suspicions rested on the young man who had accompanied her home. He was arrested, 
but discharged for want of evidence. 

" Three months after there came a kcllncr, a waiter, from some other city, to Arad. 
The lady, being in a cafe or some such place of resort, was waited on by this man, 
and saw one of her rings on his hand. He was arrested, and before the police declared 
that he held the ring in pledge, having advanced money upon it to a certain gentleman. 
This gentleman was the lady's betrothed, and he had stolen her necklace and rings. 
The gypsy had truly enough said that the articles had been taken by some one who 
was intimate in her house." 



i 9 2 GYPSY SORCERY. 

The gentleman who told me this story also said that the death of 
his father had been foretold by a gypsy — that is, by a lady who was of 
half-gypsy blood. 

It should be borne in mind, though few realize its truth, that in 
stages of society where people believe earnestly in anything — for example, 
in witchcraft or the evil eye — there results in time a state of mind or 
body in which they are actually capable of being killed with a curse, or 
a fear of seeing what is not before them in the body, and of many nervous 
conditions which are absolutely impossible and incomprehensible to the 
world of culture at the present day. But there are still places where 
witchcraft may be said to exist literally, for there the professors of the 
art to all intents work miracles, because they are believed in. There is 
abundance of such faith extant, even in England. I have heard the names 
of three " white" witch doctors in as many towns in the West of England, 
who are paid a guinea a visit, their specialty being to "unlock," or neutralize, 
or defeat the evil efforts of black witches. This, as is indeed true, indicates 
that a rather high class of patients put faith in them. In Hungary, in 
the country, the majority, even of the better class, are very much influenced 
by gypsy-witches. Witness the following, which is interesting simply 
because, while there is very little indeed in it, it was related to me as 
a most conclusive proof of magic power : — 

" In a suburb of Szegedin, inhabited only by peasants, there is a school with a farm 
attached to it. The pay of the teacher is trifling, but he can make a comfortable 
living from the land. This was held by an old man, who had a young assistant. The 
old man died ; the youth succeeded him, and as he found himself doing well, in due 
time he took a wife. They lived happily together for a year and had a daughter. 
In the spring the teacher had to work very hard, not only in school but on his farm, and 
so for the first time contracted the habit of going to the tavern to refresh himself, and 
what was worst, of concealing it from his wife under plausible tales, to which she 
gave no trust. She began to be very unhappy, and, naturally enough, suspected a 
rival. 

" Of course she took advice from a gypsy woman, wno heard all the story and 
consulted her cards. ' There is,' she said, ' no woman whatever in the way. There 
is no sign of one for good or evil, na latchi na misec, in the cards. But beware ! for 



FORTUNE-TELLING. 



i 93 



there is a great and unexpected misfortune coming, and more than this I cannot sec.' 
So she took her pay and departed. Suddenly her child fell ill and died after eight 
days. Then the husband reformed his ways, and all went well with them. So, 
you see, the gypsy foretold it all, wonderfully and accurately." 

It requires no sorcery to conjecture that the gypsy already knew the 
habits of the schoolmaster, as the Romany is generally familiar with the 
tavern of every town. To predict a misfortune at large is a sure card 
for every prophetess. What is remarkable is that a man of the world and 
one widely travelled, as was my informant, attached great importance to 
the story. It is evident that where so much of the sherris sack of faith 
accompanies such a small crust of miracle there must be a state of society 
in which miracles in their real sense are perfectly capable of being 
worked. 



— — :. : \ ..: 



•Ifi: 



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ifl '■ ■■'■<lh 



A %'\ 



26 



CHAPTER XIII. 

PROVERBS REFERRINC TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES. 




PROVERBS REFERRING TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES. 195 

Of an evil woman one says, as in all languages, " To je vila " — that 
is, "a witch" ; or it is uttered or muttered as, "To je vila ljutica" — 
that is, " a biting (or bitter) witch " ; or to a woman whom one dislikes, 
" Idi vilo ! " — " Begone, witch ! " as in gypsy, " Jasa tu chovihani ! " 

Also, as in German, " Ako i je baba, nije vjestica " — " Though she 
is an old woman she is no witch " ; while, on the other hand, we have, 
" Svake baba viestica, a djed vjestac " — " Every old woman is a witch, 
and every old man a wizard." 

The proverb, " Bizi ko vistica od biloga luka " — " she runs from it 
like a witch from white garlic" — will be found fully explained in the 
chapter on " The Cure of Children," in which it is shown that from 
early times garlic has been a well-known witch-antidote. 

Another saying is, " Uzkostrsila se ko vistica " — " Her hair is as 
tangled, or twisted, as that of a witch " ; English gypsy, " Lakis balia 
shan risserdi sar i chovihanis." But this has a slightly different meaning, 
since in the Slavonian it refers to matted, wild-looking locks, while the 
Romany is according to a belief that the hair of a witch is curled at the 
ends only. 

Allied to this is the proverb, " Izgleda kao aa su ga coprnice doniele 
sa Ivanjscica " — " He looks as if the witches had done for him (or brought 
him away, ' fetched ' him) on Saint John's Eve " ; English Romany, 
" Tuv dikela sd saved a lay sar a chovihani " — " He looks as if he had 
lain with a witch." 

" Svaka vracara s vrazje strane " — " Every witch belongs to the 
devil's gang " — that is, she has, sold her soul to him and is in his interests. 
This is allied to the saying, " Kud ce vjestica do u svoj rod?" — "Where 
should a witch go if not to her kin ? " or, " Birds of a feather flock 
together." 

" Jasa ga vjestice " — " The witches ride him " — refers to the ancient 
and world-wide belief that witches turn men into animals and ride them 
in sleep. 

The hazel tree and nut are allied to the supernatural or witchly in 



196 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



many lands. For the divining rod, which 'is, according to " La Grande 
Bacchetta Divinatoria O Verga rivelatrice " of the Abbate Valmont, the 
great instrument for all magic and marvels, must be made of " un ramo 
forcuto di nocciuolo " — " a forked branch of hazel-nut " — whence a proverb, 
" Vracarice, coprnjice, kuko Ijeskova ! " — " Sorceress, witch, hazel -stick." 
This is a reproach or taunt to a woman who pays great attention to 
magic and witchcraft. " This reveals a very ancient belief of the witch 
as a wood-spirit or fairy who dwells in the nut itself." More generally 
it is the bush which, in old German ballads, is often addressed as Lady 
Hazel. In this, as in Lady Nightingale, we have a relic of addressing 
certain animals or plants as if they were intelligences or spirits. In one 
very old song in " Des Knaben Wunderhorn," a girl, angry at the hazel, 
who has reproached her for having loved too lightly or been too frail, 
says that her brother will come and cut the bush down. To which Lady 
Hazel replies : — 

" Although he comes and cuts me down, 
I'll grow next spring, 'tis plain, 
But if a virgin wreath should fade, 
'Twill never bloom again." 

To keep children from picking unripe hazel-nuts in the Canton of 
Saint Gall they cry to them, " S' Haselnussfrauli chumt " — " The hazel-nut 
lady is coming ! " Hence a rosary of hazel-nuts or a hazel rod brings 
luck, and they may be safely hung up in a house. The hazel-nut necklaces 
found in prehistoric tombs were probably amulets as well as ornaments. 

Among popular sayings we may include the following from the 
Gorski Vijenac : — 

"A eto si udrijo vladiko, 
U nekakve smucene vjetrove, 
Ko u marcu sto udre yjestice." 



; But behold, O Vladika, 
Thou hast thrown thyself into every storm, 
As witches throw or change themselves to cattle." 



PROVERBS REFERRING TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES. 



")7 



And with these we may include the curse, " Izjele te viestice " — 
" May the witches eat you ! " which has its exact parallel in Romany. 
Also the Scottish saying, " Witches, warlocks, and gypsies soon ken ae 
the ither " : — 

"Witches and warlocks without any bother, 
Like gypsies on meeting well know one another." 

I may appropriately add to these certain proverbs which are given in 
an extremely rare " Denham Tract," of which only fifty copies were 
printed by John Bell Richmond, "in. Com. EborP This quaint little 
work of only six pages is entitled, " A Few Popular Rhymes, Proverbs, 
and Sayings relating to Fairies, Witches, and Gypsies," and bears the 
dedication, " To every individual Fairy, Witch, and Gypsy from the day 
of the Witch of Endor down to that of Billy Dawson, the Wise Man 
of Stokesley, lately defunct, this tract is inscribed." 

Witches. 

Vervain and Dill 

Hinder witches from their will. 

The following refers to rowan or mountain-ash wood, which is 
supposed to be a charm against witchcraft : — 

If your whipstick's made of rowan 
You can ride your nag thro' any town. 

Much about a pitch, 

Quoth the devil to the witch. 

A hairy man's a geary man, 
But a hairy wife's a witch. 

Woe to the lad 

Without a rowan-tree god. 

A witch-wife and an evil 

Is three-halfpence worse than the devil. 



198 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Hey-how for Hallow-e'en ! 

When all the witches are to be seen, 

Some in black and some in green, 

Hey-how for Hallow- e'en ! 

Thout ! tout ! a tout, tout ! 

Throughout and about. 

Cummer goe ye before, cummer goe ye, 
Gif ye will not goe before, cummer let me ! 

" These lines are said to have been sung by witches at North Berwick 
in Lothian, accompanied by the music of a Jew's harp or trump, which 
was played by Geilles Duncan, a servant girl, before two hundred witches, 
who joined hands in a short daunce or reel, singing (also) these lines 
with one voice : — 

"'Witchy, witchy, I defy thee, 
Four fingers round my thumb, 
Let me go quietly by thee.' 

" It will be seen that this is a phallic sign, and as such dreaded by 
witches. It is difficult to understand why these verses with the sign 
should have been given by witches." 

" The anti-witch rhyme used in Tweedesdale some sixty or seventy 

years ago was : — 

" ' Black-luggie, lammer bead, 
Rowan-tree and reed thread, 
Put the witches to their speed.' 

"The meaning of 'black-luggie' I know not. 'Lammer bead' is 
a corruption of ' amber-bead.' They are still worn by a few old people 
in Scotland as a preservative against a variety of diseases, especially asthma, 
dropsy, and toothache. They also preserve the wearer from the effects 
of witchcraft, as stated in the text. I have seen a twig of rowan-tree, 
witch-wood, quick-bane, wild ash, wicken-tree, wicky, wiggy, witchen, 
witch-bane, royne-tree, mountain-ash, whitty, wiggin, witch-hazel, roden- 
quicken, roden-quicken-royan, roun, or ran-tree, which had been gathered 



PROVERBS REFERRING TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES, i 



99 



on the second of May (observe this), wound round with some dozens of 
yards of red thread, placed visible in the window to act as a charm in 
keeping witches and Boggle-boes from the house. So also we have— 

" ' Rowan-ash and reed thread 

Keep the devils from their speed.'" 

Ye brade o' witches, ye can do no good to yourself. 

Fair they came, 

Fair they go, 

And always their heels behind them. 

Neither so sinful as to sink, nor so godly as to swim. 

Falser than Waghorn, and he was nineteen times falser than the devil. 

Ingratitude is worse than witchcraft. 

Ye're as mitch 
As half a witch. 

To milk the tether (/.*., the cow-tie). 
This refers to a belief that witches can carry off the milk from any 
one's cow by milking at the end of the tether. 

Go in God's name — so you ride no witches. 

" Rynt, you witch!" quoth Bess Lockit to her mother. 

Rynt, according to Skeat, is the original Cumberland word for 

"aroint," i.e., "aroint thee, get thee gone." Icelandic ryma — "to make 

room, to clear the way " — given, however, only as a guess. It seems to 

have been specially applied to witches. 

"'Aroint thee, witch!' the rump-fed ronyon cried." 

(" Macbeth "). 

Halliwell gives the word as rynt, and devotes a column to it, without 
coming to any satisfactory conclusion. I think it is simply the old word 
rynt or wrynt, another form of writhe, meaning to twist or strangle, as 
if one should say, " Be thou strangled ! " which was indeed a frequent 
malediction. Halliwell himself gives "wreint" as meaning IC awry," and 



aoo G YPS Y SORCER Y. 

" wreith destordre" — "to wring or wreith" (" Hollyband's Dictionarie," 
1593). The commonest curse of English gypsies at the present day is 
" Beng tasser tute I " " May the devil strangle you " — literally twist \ which 
is an exact translation of wrinthe or rynt. 

" The gode man to hys cage can goo 
And zvrythed the pye's neck yn to." 

(" MS. Cantab." ap. H.) 

Rynt may mean twist away, i.e., begone, as they say in America, " he 
wriggled away." 

They that burn you for a witch lose all their coals. 

Never talk of witches on a Friday. 

Ye're ower aude ffarand to be fraid o' witches. 

Witches are most apt to confess on a Friday. 

Friday is the witches' Sabbath. 

To hug one as the devil hugs a witch. 



As black 
As cross 
As ugly 
As sinful 



-as a witch. 



Four fingers and a thumb — witch, I defy thee. 
In Italy the signs are made differently. In Naples the gettatura consists 
of throwing out the fore and middle fingers, so as to imitate horns, with 
the thumb and fingers closed. Some say the thumb should be within the 
middle and third fingers. In Florence the anti-witch gesture is to fare la 
fica, or stick the thumb out between the fore and middle fingers. 
You're like a witch, you say your prayers backward. 
Witch-wood {i.e., the mountain ash). 
You're half a witch — i.e., very cunning. 
Buzz ! buzz ! buzz ! 
" In the middle of the sixteenth century if a person waved his hat or 



PROVERBS REFERRING TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES. 201 

bonnet in the air and cried ' Buzz ! ' three times, under the belief that by 
this act he could take the life of another, the old law and law-makers 
considered the person so saying and acting to be worthy of death, he being 
a murderer in intent, and having dealings with witches" ("Denham Tract"). 
Very doubtful, and probably founded on a well known old story. 

"I wish I was as far from God as my nails are free from dirt ! " 
Said to have been a witch's prayer whilst she was in the act of cleaning 
her nails. In logical accuracy this recalls the black boy in America, who on 
being asked if he knew the way to a certain place, replied, " I only wish I 
had as many dollars as I know my way there." 

A witch is afraid of her own blood. 

A Pendle forest witch. 

A Lancashire witch. 

A witch cannot greet {i.e., weep). 

To be hog, or witch-ridden. 



So many gypsies, so many smiths. 
The gypsies are all akin. 

One of the Faw gang, 
Worse than the Faw gang. 

The Faws or Faas are a gypsy family whose head-quarters are at 
Yetholme. I have been among them and knew the queen of the gypsies 
and her son Robert, who were of this clan or name. 

" It is supposed the Faws acquired this appellation from Johnnie Faw, 
lord and earl of Little Egypt ; with whom James the Fourth and Queen 
Mary, sovereigns of Scotland, saw not only the propriety, but also the 
necessity of entering into special treaty" (" Denham Tract "). 

"Francis Heron, king of the Faws, bur. (Yarrow) xiii. Jan., 1756" 

(Sharp's " Chron. Mir"). 

27 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



Fairies. 

Where the scythe cuts and the sock rives, 
No more fairies and bee-hives. 

Laugh like a pixy {i.e., fairy). 

Waters locked ! waters locked ! (A favourite cry of fairies.) 

Borram ! borram ! borram ! (The cry of the Irish fairies after mounting their steeds. 
Equivalent to the Scottish cry, "Horse! horse and hattock ! ") 

To live in the land of the Fair family. (A Welsh fairy saying.) 

God grant that the fairies may put money in your shoes and keep your house clean. 
(One of the good wishes of the old time.) 

Fairies comb goats' beards every Friday. 

He who finds a piece of money will always find another in the same place, so long as he 
keeps it a secret. (In reference to fairy gifts.) 

It's going on, like Stokepitch's can. 

A pixey or fairy saying, used in Devonshire. The family of Stokespitch 
or Sukespic resided near Topsham, and a barrel of ale in their cellars had for 
many years run freely without being exhausted. It was considered a valuable 
heirloom, and was esteemed accordingly, till an inquisitive maidservant took 
out the bung to ascertain the cause why it never run dry. On looking into 
the cask she found it full of cobwebs, but the fairies, it would seem, were 
offended, for on turning the cock, as usual, the ale had ceased to flow. 

It was a common reply at Topsham to the inquiry how any affair wen 
on : " It's going on like Stokepitch's can," or proceeding prosperously. 

To laugh like Robin Goodfellow. 

To laugh like old Bogie ; 
He caps Bogie. 
(Amplified to " He caps Bogie, and Bogie capped old Nick.") 

To play the Puck. (An Irish saying, equivalent to the English one, " To play the deuce 
or devil." Keightley's " Fairy Mythology.") 

He has got into Lob's pound or pond. (That is, into the fairies' pinfold. Keightley's 
" Fairy Mythology.") 



PROVERBS REFERRING TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES. 203 

Pinch like a fairy. (" Pinch them, arms, legs, backs, shoulders, sides, and shins." " Merry 
Wives of Windsor.") 

To be fairy-struck. (The paralysis is, or rather perhaps was, so called. Keightley's 
" Fairy Mythology.") 

There has never been a merry world since the Phynoderee lost his ground. [A Manx 
fairy saying. See Train's "Isle of Man," ii. p. 148. "Popular Rhymes of the Isle 
of Man," pp. 16, 17.] 

To be pixey-led. 

Led astray by fairies or goblins. " When a man has got a wee drap 
ower muckle whuskey, misses his way home, and gets miles out of his direct 
course, he tells a tale of excuse and whiles lays the blame on the innocent 
pixies " (see Keightley's " Fairy Mythology "). Also recalling Feufollet, 
or the Will o' the Wisp, and the traveller who 

" thro' bog and bush 
Was lantern-led by Friar Rush." 

Gypsies have from their out of doors life much familiarity with these 
" spirits " whom they call mullo dudia, or mullo doods, i.e., dead or ghost 
lights. For an account of the adventure of a gypsy with them, see " The 
English Gypsies and their Language," by C. G. Leland. London : 
Triibner & Co. " Pyxie-led is to be in a maze, to be bewildered as if led 
out of the way by hobgoblins or puck, or one of the fairies. The cure is to 
turn one of your garments the inside outward ; some say that is for a woman 
to turn her cap inside outward, and for a man to do the same with some of 
his clothes" (MS. ''Devon Glimpses "— Halliwell). "Thee pixie-led in 
Popish piety" (Clobery's "Divine Glimpses," 1659). 

The fairies' lanthorn. 

That is the glow-worm. In America a popular story represents an 
Irishman as believing that a fire-fly was a mosquito " sakirC his prey wid a 

lanthorn." 

God speed you, gentlemen ! 

" When an Irish peasant sees a cloud of dust sweeping along the road, 



2o 4 GYPSY SORCERY. 

he raises his hat and utters this blessing in behoof of y e company of invisible 
fairies who, as he believes, caused it" ("Fairy Mythology"). 

The Phooka have dirtied the blackberries. 
Said when the fruit of the blackberry is spoiled through age or covered 
with dust at the end of the season. In the North of England we say " the 
devil has set his foot on the Bumble-Kites " (" Denham Tract "). 

Fairy, fairy, bake me a bannock and roast me a collop, 

And I'll give ye a spintle off my god end. 
" This is spoken three times by the Clydesdale peasant when ploughing, 
because he believes that on getting to the end of the fourth furrow those 
good things will be found spread out on the grass " (Chambers' " Popular 
Rhymes, Scotland," 3rd ed. p. 106). 

Turn your clokes {i.e., coats), 

For fairy folkes 

Are in old oakes. 
" I well remember that on more occasions than one, when a schoolboy, 
I have turned and worn my coat inside out in passing through a wood in 
order to avoid the ' good people.' On nutting days, those glorious red- 
letter festivals in the schoolboy's calendar, the use pretty generally pre- 
vailed. The rhymes in the text are the English formula " (" Denham 

Tract "). 

He's got Pigwiggan. 

" Vulgarly called Peggy Wiggan. A severe fall or somerset is so 

termed in the B'prick. The fairy Pigwiggan is celebrated by Drayton in 

is Nymphidia " (" Denham Tract "). To which may be added a few 

more from other sources. 

Do what you may, say what you can, 

No washing e'er whitens the black Zingan. 

(" Firdusi.") 

For every gypsy that comes to toon, 
A hen will be a-missing soon, 
And for every gypsy woman old, 
A maiden's fortune will be told. 



PROVERBS REFERRING TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES. 205 

Gypsy hair and devil's eyes, 

Ever stealing, full of lies, 

Yet always poor and never wise. 

He who has never lived like a gypsy does not know how to enjoy life as a gentleman. 

I never enjoyed the mere living as regards all that constitutes ordinary 
respectable life so keenly as I did after some weeks of great hunger, 
exposure, and misery, in an artillery company in 1863, at the time of the 
battle of Gettysburg. 

Zigeuner Leben Greiner Leben. (Gipsy life a groaning life. Korte's " Sprichworter d. D.") 

Er taugt nicht zum Zigeuner. Spottisch vom Liigner gesagt weil er nicht wahr-sagt. 
(Korte, "Sprichworter.") 

"He would not do^ for a gypsy." Said of a liar because he cannot 

tell the truth. In fe German to predict or tell fortunes also means to speak 

truly, i.e., wahr=tr\}e, and sprechen=to speak. 

Gypsy repentance for stolen hens is not worth much. {Old German Saying.) 

The Romany chi 
And the Romany chal 
Love luripen 
And lutchipen 
And dukkeripen 
And huknipen 
And every pen 
But latchipen 
And tatchipen. 

The gypsy woman 
And gypsy man 
Love stealing 
And lewdness 
And fortune telling 
And lying 
And every pen 
But shame 
And truth. 
Pen is the termination of all verbal nouns. 

(George Borrow, Quoted from memory.) 



2o6 GYPSY SORCERY. 

It's a winter morning. 
Meaning a bad day, or that matters look badly. In allusion to the 
Winters, a gypsy clan with a bad name. 

As wild as a gypsy. 
Puro romaneskoes. (In the old gypsy fashion.) 
Sie hat 'nen Kobold. ("She has a brownie, or house-fairy.") 
" Said of a girl who does everything deftly and readily. In some 
places the peasants believe that a fairy lives in the house, who does the 
work, brings water or wood, or curries the horses. Where such a fairy 
dwells, all succeeds if he or she is kindly treated" (Korte's "German 
Proverbs"). 

" Man siehet wohl wess Geisters Kind Sie (Er.) 1st." 

" One can well see what spirit was his sire." In allusion to men of 
singular or eccentric habits, who are believed to have been begotten by 
the incubus, or goblins, or fairies. There are ceremonies by which spirits 
may be attracted to come to people in dreams. 

" There was a young man who lived near Monte Lupo, and one 
day he found in a place among some old ruins a statue of a fate (fairy 
or goddess) all naked. He set it up in its shrine, and admiring it 
greatly embraced it with love (ut semen ejus profluit super statuam). 
And that night and ever after the fate came to him in his dreams and 
lay with him, and told him where to find treasures, so that he became 
a rich man. But he lived no more among men, nor did he after that 
ever enter a church. And I have heard that any one who will do as he 
did can draw the fate to come to him, for they are greatly desirous to 
be loved and worshipped by men as they were in the Roman times." 

The following are Hungarian or Transylvanian proverbs : — 

False as a Tzigane, i.e., gypsy. 

Dirty as a gypsy. 

They live like gypsies (said of a quarrelsome couple). 



PROVERBS REFERRING TO WITCHES, GYPSIES, AND FAIRIES. 
He moans like a guilty Tzigane (said of a man given to useless lamenting). 



207 



He knows how to plow with the gypsies (said of a liar). Also : " He knows how to ride 
the gypsies' horse." 

He knows the gypsy trade (i.e., he is a thief). 

Tzigane weather (i.e., a showery day). 

It is gypsy honey (i.e., adulterated). 

A gypsy duck i.e., a poor sort of wild duck. 

"The gypsy said his favourite bird would be the pig if it had only wings" (in allusion 
to the gypsy fondness for pork). 

Mrs. Gerard gives a number of proverbs as current among Hungarian 
gypsies which appear to be borrowed by them from those of other races. 
Among them are : — 

Who would steal potatoes must not forget the sack. 

The best smith cannot make more than one ring at a time. 

Nothing is so bad but it is good enough for somebody. 

Bacon makes bold. 

" He eats his faith as the gypsies ate their church." 
A Wallach proverb founded on another to the effect that the gypsy 
church was made of pork and the dogs ate it. I shall never forget how 
an old gypsy in Brighton laughed when I told her this, and how she 
repeated : " O Romani kangri sos kerdo ballovas te i juckli hawde lis." 

"No entertainment without gypsies." 
In reference to gypsy musicians who are always on hand at every 
festivity. 

The Hungarian wants only a glass of water and a gypsy fiddler to make him drunk. 
In reference to the excitement which Hungarians experience in 
listening to gypsy music. 

With a wet rag you can put to flight a whole village of gypsies (Hungarian). 

It would not be advisable to attempt this with any gypsies in Great 



208 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



Britain, where they are almost, without exception, only too ready to fight 
with anybody. 

Every gypsy woman is a witch. 

" Every woman is at heart a witch." 

In the " Materials for the Study of the Gypsies," by M. I. Kounavine, 
which I have not yet seen, there are, according to A. B. ElysseefF 
{Gypsy-Lore Journal, July, 1890), three or four score of gypsy proverbial 
sayings and maxims. These refer to Slavonian or far Eastern Russian 
Romanis. I may here state in this connection that all who are interested 
in this subject, or aught relating to it, will find much to interest them 
in this journal of the Gypsy-Lore Society, printed by T. & A. Constable, 
Edinburgh. The price of subscription, including membership of the 
society, is ^1 a year — Address : David Mac Ritchie, 4, Archibald Place, 
Edinburgh. 




CHAPTER XIV. 



A GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. HOKKANI BASO LELLIN DUDIKABIN, OR THE 

GREAT SECRET CHILDREN'S RHYMES AND INCANTATIONS TEN LITTLE 

INDIAN BOYS AND TEN LITTLE ACORN GIRLS OF MARCELLUS BURDI- 
GALENSIS. 

HERE is a meaningless 
rhyme very common 
among children. It is 
repeated while " counting 
off" — or "out" — those 
who are taking part in 
a game, and allotting to each 
a place. There are many ver- 
sions of it, but the following is 
exactly word for word what I 
learned when a boy in Phila- 
s=" delphia : — 

Ekkcri (or ickery), akkery, u-kcry an, 
Fillisi', follasy, Nicholas John, 
Oueebce -quabce — Irishman (or, Irish 

Mary), 
Stinglc 'em — stanglc 'cm — buck ! 

With a very little alteration 

■ This chapter is reproduced, but with much addition, from one in my work entitled 
"The Gypsies," published in Boston, 1881, by Houghton and Mifflin. London: 
Trubner & Co. The addition will be the most interesting portion to the folk-lorist 

28 




aio GYPSY SORCERY. 

in sounds, and not more than children make of these verses in different 
places, this may be read as follows : — 

Ek-keri (yekori) akairi, you kair an, 
Fillissin, follasy, Nakelas jan 
Kivi, kavi — Irishman, 
Stini, stani — buck ! 

This is, of course, nonsense, but it is Romany or gypsy nonsense, 
and it may be thus translated very accurately : — 

First — here — you begin ! 
Castle, gloves. You don't play ! 

Go on ! 
Kivi — a kettle. How are you ? 
Stdni, buck. 

The common version of the rhyme begins with — 

" One — ery — two — ery, ickery an." 

But one-ery is an exact translation of ek-keri ; ek, or yek, meaning 
one in gypsy. (Ek-orus, or yek-korus, means once). And it is remarkable 
that in — 

"Hickory dickory dock, 
The rat ran up the clock, 
The clock struck one, 
And down he run, 
Hickory dickory dock." 

We have hickory , or ek-keri, again followed by a significant one. 
It may be observed that j while my first quotation abounds in what are 
unmistakably Romany words, I can find no trace of any in any other 
child- rhymes of the kind. I lay stress on this, for if I were a great 
Celtic scholar I should not have the least difficulty in proving that every 
word in every rhyme, down to " Tommy, make room for your uncle," 
was all old Irish or Gaelic. 



G YPS Y MA GIC SPELL. 2 x r 

Word for word every person who understands Romany will admit 
the following : — 

Ek, or yek, means one. Tekorus, ekorus, or yeckori, or ekkeri, once. 

U-kair-an. Tou kair an, or begin. Kair is to make or do, dnhair to begin. "Do 
you begin ? " 

Fillissin is a castle, or gentleman's country seat (H. Smith). 

Follasi, or follasy, is a lady's glove. 

Ndkelas. I learned this word from an old gypsy. It is used as equivalent to don't, 
but also means nd (li'elas), you don't play. From kel-ava, I play, 

Jdn, Jd-an, Go on. From Java, I go. Hindu, jdna, and jdo. 

Kivi, or \eevy. No meaning. 

Kavi, a kettle, from kekdvi, commonly given as kavi. Greek, kekk&Poq. Hindu, ka/, 
a box. 

Stint. No meaning that I know. 

Stdni. A buck. 

Of the last line it may be remarked that if we take from ingle 'em [angle 'em), which 
is probably added for mere jingle, there remains stdn, or stdni, "a buck," followed by 
the very same word in English. 

With the mournful examples of Mr. Bellenden Kerr's efforts to show 
that all our old proverbs, saws, sayings, and tavern signs are Dutch, and 
Sir William Betham's Etruscan-Irish, and the works of an army of 
" philologists," who consider mere chance resemblance to be a proof of 
identical origin, I should be justly regarded as one of the seekers for 
mystery in moonshine if I declared that I positively believed this to be 
Romany. But it certainly contains words which, without any stretching 
or fitting, are simply gypsy, and I think it not improbable that it was 
some sham, charm used by some Romany fortune-teller to bewilder 
Gorgios. Let the reader imagine the burnt-sienna, wild-cat-eyed old 
sorceress performing before a credulous farm-wife and her children, the 
great ceremony of hakkni pdnki — which Mr. Borrow calls hokkani bdro, 
but for which there is a far deeper name — that of "the great secret" 
— which even my best Romany friends tried to conceal from me. This 
is to lei dudikabin — to " take lightment." In the oldest English canting, 
lightment occurs as an equivalent for theft — whether it came from Romany, 
or Romany from it, I cannot tell. 



212 GYPSY SORCERY. 

This feat — which is described by almost every writer on Gypsies — is 
performed by inducing some woman of largely magnified faith to believe 
that there is hidden in her house a magic treasure, which can only be 
made " to come to hand " by depositing in the cellar another treasure, to 
which it will come by natural affinity and attraction. " For gold, as 
you sees, draws gold, my deari, and so if you ties up all your money in 
a pocket-handkercher, an' leaves it, you'll find it doubled. An' wasn't 
there the Squire's lady — you know Mrs. Trefarlo, of course — and didn't 
she draw two hundred old gold guineas out of the ground where they'd 
laid in an old grave— and only one guinea she gave me for all my trouble ; 
an' I hope you'll do better than that for the poor old gypsy, my deari ." 

The gold and the spoons are all tied up — for, as the enchantress 
sagely observes, " there may be silver too " — and she solemnly repeats 
over it magical rhymes, while the children, standing around in awe, listen 
to every word. It is a good subject for a picture. Sometimes the 
windows are closed, and candles lighted — to add to the effect. The 
bundle is left or buried in a certain place. The next day the gypsy 
comes and sees how the charm is working. Could any one look under 
her cloak, he might find another bundle precisely resembling the one con- 
taining the treasure. She looks at the precious deposit, repeats her 
rhyme again solemnly and departs, after carefully charging the house-wife 
that the bundle must not be touched, looked at, or spoken of for three 
weeks. "Every word you tell about it, my deari, will be a guinea gone 
away." Sometimes she exacts an oath on the Bible, when she chivs o 
manzin apre latti — that nothing shall be said. 

Back to the farmer's house never again. After three weeks another 
Extraordinary Instance of Gross Credulity appears in the country paper, and 
is perhaps repeated in a colossal London daily, with a reference to the 
absence of the schoolmaster. There is wailing and shame in the house 
— perhaps great suffering — for it may be that the savings of years, and 
bequeathed tankards, and marriage rings, and inherited jewellery, and 
mother's souvenirs have been swept away. The charm has worked. 



GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. 213 

" How can people be such fools ! " Yea — how can they ? How can 
fully ninety-nine out of one hundred, and I fear me nine hundred and 
ninety-nine out of a thousand, be capable of what amounts to precisely 
the same thing — paying out their cash in the hopes that the Invisible 
Influences in the Inscrutable Cellar or Celestial Garret will pay it back to 
them, cent, per cent.? Oh, reader, if you be of middle age (for there are 
perhaps some young agnostics beginning to appear to whom the cap does 
not fit), and can swear on your hat that you never in your life have been 
taken in by a dudikabin in any form — send me your name and I will 
award you for an epitaph that glorious one given in the Nuga Venales : 

"Hie jacet ille qui unus fuit inter mille ! " 

The charm has worked. But the little sharp-eared children remember 
it, and sing it over, and the more meaningless it sounds in their ears, the 
more mysterious does it become. And they never talk about the bundle 
— which when opened was found to contain only stones, sticks, and rags — 
without repeating it. So it goes from mouth to mouth, until, all mutilated, 
it passes current for even worse nonsense than it was at first. It may be 
observed, however — and the remark will be fully substantiated by any one 
who knows the gypsy language — that there is a Romany turn to even the 
roughest corners of these rhymes. Kivi, stingli, stangli, are all gypsyish. 
But, as I have already intimated, this does not appear in any other 
nonsense verses of the kind. There is nothing of it in — 

" Intery, mintery, cutery corn," 

•or in anything else in " Mother Goose." It is alone in its sounds and 
sense — or nonsense. But there is not a wanderer on the roads in 
England who on hearing it would not exclaim, " There's a great deal of 
Romanes in that ere ! " And if any one doubts it let him try it on any 
gypsy who has an average knowledge of Romany. 

I should say that the word Na-Kelas, which means literally " Do 
not play," or, " You do not play," was explained to me by a gypsy 



214 GYPSY SORCERY. 

as signifying not speaking, or keeping quiet. Nicholas John has really 
no meaning, hut ' c You don't play — go on," fits exactly into a counting- 
out game. 

The mystery of mysteries in the Romany tongue — of which I have 
spoken — is this: The hokkani baro, or huckeny boro, or great trick, con- 
sists of three parts. Firstly, the getting into a house or into the 
confidence of its owner, which is effected in England by offering small 
wares for sale, or by begging for food, but chiefly by fortune-telling, 
the latter being the usual pretence in America. If the gypsy woman 
be at all prepared, she will have learned enough to amaze " the lady 
of the house," who is thereby made ready to believe anything. The 
second part of the trick is the conveying away the property, which is, 
as I have said, to lei diidikabin, or " take lightning," possibly connected 
with the old canting term for conveyance of bien lightment. There is 
evidently a confusion of words here. And third is to u chiv o manzin 
afr'e lati " to put the oath upon her — the victim- — by which she binds 
herself not to speak of the affair for some weeks. When the deceived 
are all under oath not to utter a word about the trick, the gypsy 
mother has a safe thing of it. 

The hokkani boro, or great trick, or dildikabin, was brought by the 
gypsies from the East. It has been practised by them all over the 
world, and is still played every day somewhere. And I have read in 
the Press of Philadelphia that a Mrs. Brown — whom I sadly and re- 
luctantly believe is the wife of an acquaintance of mine who walks 
before the world in other names — was arrested for the same old game 
of fortune-telling, and persuading a simple dame that there was treasure 
in the house, and all the rest of the " grand deception." And Mrs. 
Brown — " good old Mrs. Brown " — went to prison, where she doubtless 
lingered until a bribed alderman, or a purchased pardon, or some one 
of the numerous devices by which justice is easily evaded in Pennsylvania,, 
delivered her. 

Yet it is not a good country on the whole for hakkani boro } since 



GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. 215 

the people, especially in the rural districts, have a rough and ready way 
of inflicting justice, which sadly interferes with the profits of aldermen 
and other politicians. Some years ago, in Tennessee, a gypsy woman 
robbed a farmer of all he was worth. Now it is no slander to say that 
the rural folk of Tennessee resemble Indians in several respects, and when 
I saw thousands of them during the Civil War, mustered out in 
Nashville, I often thought, as I studied these dark brown faces, high 
cheek-bones, and long, straight, wiry hair, that the American is indeed 
reverting to the aboriginal type. The Tennessee farmer and his friends 
reverted to it at any rate with a vengeance, for they turned out altogether, 
hunted the gypsies down, and having secured the sorceress, burned her 
alive at the stake. Which has been, as I believe, "an almighty warning" 
to the Romany in that sad section of the world. And thus in a single 
crime, and its consequence, we have curiously combined a world-old 
Oriental offence, an European Middle Age penalty for witchcraft, and the 
fierce torture of the Red Indian. 

In the United States there is often to be found in a gypsy camp 
a negro or two who has with no great trouble adopted a life of perfect 
laziness. I infer that these men and brothers have not improved much 
in their morals, since a few years ago a coloured sorcerer appeared in 
Philadelphia, who, as I was assured, " persuaded half the niggers in 
Lombard Street to dig up their cellars to find treasure — and carried off 
all the treasures they had." He had been, like Matthew Arnold's 
scholar, among the tents of the Romany, and had learned their peculiar 
wisdom, and turned it to profit. 

In Germany the Great Sorcery is practised with variations, and indeed 
in England or America or anywhere it is modified in many ways to suit 
the victims. The following methods are described by Dr. Richard 
Liebich, in " Die Zigeuner in ihrem Wesen und in ihrer Sprache " 
(Leipzig, 1863) :— 

"When a gypsy has found some old peasant who has the reputation of being rich 
or very well-to-do he sets himself to work with utmost care to learn the disposition 



216 GYPSY SORCERY. 

of the man with every possible detail as to his house and habits." (It is easy and con- 
genial work to people who pass their lives in learning all they can of other folks'' 
affairs to aid in fortune-telling, to find out the soft spots, as Sam Slick calls the pecu- 
liarities by which a man may be influenced.) "And so some day, when all the rest of the 
family are in the fields, the gypsy — man or woman — comes, and entering into a conver- 
sation, leads it to the subject of the house, remarking that it is a belief among his. 
people that in it a treasure lies buried. He offers, if he may have permission to take it 
away, to give one-fourth, a third, or a half its value. This all seems fair enough, but the 
peasant is greedy and wants more. The gypsy, on his side, also assumes suspicion and 
distrust. He proves that he is a conjuror by performing some strange tricks — thus he 
takes an egg from under a hen, breaks it, and apparently brings out a small human skull or 
some strange object, and finally persuades the peasant to collect all his coin and other 
valuables in notes, gold, or silver, into a bundle, cautioning him to hold them fast. 
He must go to bed and put the packet under his pillow, while he, the conjuror, 
finds the treasure. This done — probably in a darkened room — he takes a bundle of 
similar appearance which he has quickly prepared, and under pretence of facilitating 
the operation and putting the man into a proper position, takes the original package and 
substitutes another. Then the victim is cautioned that it is of the utmost importance 
for him to lie perfectly still ;" 

" Nor move his hand nor blink his 'ee 
If ever he hoped the goud to see ; 
For aye aboot on ilka limb, 
The fairies had their 'een on him." 

The gypsy is over the hills and far far away ere the shades of 
evening fall, and the family returning from their fields find the father in 
bed refusing to speak a word ; for he has been urgently impressed 
with the assertion that the longer he holds his tongue and keeps the 
affair a secret the more money he will' make. And the extreme super- 
stition of the German peasant is such that when obliged to tell the 
truth he often believes that all his loss is due to a premature forced 
revelation of what he has done — for the gypsy in many cases has the cheek 
to caution the victim that if he speaks too soon the contents of the 
package will be turned to sand or rags — accordingly as he has pre 
pared it. 

Another and more impudent manner of playing this pretended 
sorcery, is to persuade the peasant that he must have a thick cloth tied 



GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. 217 

around his head, and if any one addresses him to reply only by what in 
German is called brummen — uttering a kind of growl. This he does, 
when the- entire party proceed to carry off everything portable — 

" Chairs and tables knives and forks, 

Tankards and bottles and cups and corks, 

Beds and dishes and boots and kegs, 

Bacon and puddings and milk and eggs, 

The carpet lying on the floor, 

And the hams hung up for the winter store, 

Every pillow and sheet and bed, 

The dough in the trough and the baken bread, 

Every bit of provant or pelf ; 

All that they left was the house itself." 

One may imagine what the scene is like when the rest return and 
find the house plundered, the paterfamilias sitting in the ruins with his 
head tied up, answering all frantic queries with brum — brum — brum ! 
It may recall the well-known poem — I think it is by Peter Pindar 
Wolcott — of the man who was persuaded by a bet to make the motion 
of a pendulum, saying, " Here she goes — there she goes ! " while the 
instigator " cleared out the house and then cleared out himself." I have 
little doubt that this poem was drawn from a Romany original. 

Or yet, again, the gypsy having obtained the plunder and substi- 
tuted the dummy packet, persuades the true believer to bury it in the 
barn, garden, field, or a forest, performs magic ceremonies and repeats 
incantations over it, and cautions him to dig it up again, perhaps six 
months later on a certain day, it may be his saint's or birth day, and to 
keep silence till then. The gypsy makes it an absolute condition — nay, 
he insists very earnestly on it — that the treasure shall not be dug up 
unless he himself is on the spot to share the spoil. But as he may 
possibly be prevented from coming, he tells the peasant how to proceed : 
he leaves with him several pieces of paper inscribed with cabalistic cha- 
racters which are to be burnt when the money is removed, and teaches 
him what he is to repeat while doing it. With sequence as before. 

29 



2 i8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

It might be urged by the gypsy that the taking a man's money 
from him under the conditions that he shall get it all back with immense 
interest six months after, does not differ materially from persuading him 
to give his property to Brahmins, or even priests, with the understanding 
that he is to be amply rewarded for it in a future state. In both cases 
the temptation to take the money down is indeed great — as befel a certain 
very excellently honest but extremely cautious Scotch clergyman, to whom 
there once came a very wicked and wealthy old reprobate who asked 
him, " If I gie a thousand puns till the kirk d'ye think it wad save my 
soul ? " " I'm na preparit to preceesely answer that question," said the 
shrewd dominie, " but I would vara urgently advise ye to try it." 

Oh thou who persuadest man that for money down great good shall 
result to him from any kind of spiritual incantation — twist and turn it 
as ye will — mutato nomine, de te fabula narratur : 

" With but a single change of name, 
The story fits thee quite the same." 

And few and far between are the Roman ys — or even the Roman's — 
who would not " vara earnestly advise ye to try it." 

Since I wrote that last line I have met, in the Journal of American 
Folk-Lore, with a very interesting article on the Counting-out Rhymes 
of Children, in which the writer, H. Carrington Bolton, avows his 
belief that these doggerel verses or rhymes are the survivals of sortileges 
or divination by lot, and that it was practised among the ancient 
heathen nations as well as the Israelites : — 

" The use of the lot at first received divine sanction, as in the story of Achan related 
by Joshua, but after this was withheld the practice fell into the hands of sorcerers — 
which very name signifies lot-taker. The doggerels themselves I regard as a survival of 
the spoken charms used by sorcerers in ancient times in conjunction with their mystic 
incantations. There are numerous examples of these charms, such as — 

" ' Huat Hanat Huat ista pista sista domiabo damnaustra.' 

(Cato, 235 B.C.) 
" And— 

" ' Irriori, ririori essere rhuder fere.' 



G YPS Y MA GIC SPELL. 2 1 9 

" And— 

" ' Meu, treu, mor, phor 
Teux, za, zor 
Phe, lou, chri, 
Ge, ze, on.' 

(Alexander of Tralles.) 

" Tylor in his ' Primitive Culture ' holds that things which occupy an important 
place in the life-history of grown men in a savage state become the playthings of children 
in a period of civilization ; thus the sling and the bow and arrow, which formed the 
weapons of mankind in an early stage of its existence, and are still the reliance of 
savage tribes, have become toys in the hands of all civilized children at the present 
day. Many games current in Europe and America are known to be sportive imitations 
of customs which formerly had a significant and serious aspect. 

"Adopting this theory, I hold that counting-out is a survival of the practice 
of the sorcerer, using this word in its restricted and etymological meaning, and that the 
spoken and written charms originally used to enforce priestly power have become adjuncts 
to these puerile games, and the basis of the counting-out doggrels under consideration. 

" The idea that European and American children engaged in ' counting-out ' for games, 
are repeating in innocent ignorance the practices and language of a sorcerer of a dark 
age, is perhaps startling, but can be shown to have a high degree of probability. The 
leader in 'counting out' performs an incantation, but the children grouped round him are 
free from that awe and superstitious reverence which characterized the procedure in its 
earlier state. Many circumstances make this view plausible, and clothe the doggrels 
with a new and fascinating interest." 

Mr. Bolton remarks, however, that " in only one instance have I been 
able to directly connect a child's counting-out rhyme with a magic spell. 
According to Leland the rhyme beginning with 

' One-ery, two-ery, ickery, Ann,' 

is a gypsy magic spell in the Romany language." 

It occurred to me long, long ago, or before ever the name " Folk- 
lore " existed, that children's rhymes were a survival of incantations, and 
that those which are the same backward and forward were specially 
adapted to produce marvellous effects in lots. But there was one form 
of counting-out which was common as it was terrible. This was used 
when after a victory it was usual to put every tenth captive to death — 
whence the greatly abused word to "decimate" — or any other number 



220 GYPSY SORCERY. 

selected. When there was a firm belief in the virtues of numbers as set 
forth by Pythagoras, and Plato in the Tim<eus, and of cabalistic names 
inspired by the " Intelligences," it is not remarkable that the diviners or 
priests or sorcerers or distributors of sortes and sortileges should endeavour 
to prove that life and death lay bound up in mystic syllables. That 
there were curious and occult arithmetical means of counting -out and 
saving elected persons is shown in certain mystic problems still existent 
in Boys Own Books, and other handbooks of juvenile sports. It was the 
one on whom the fatal word of life or death fell who was saved or 
condemned, so that it was no wonder that the word was believed to be 
a subtle, mysterious existence : an essence or principle, yea, a spirit or all 
in one — diversi aspetti in un, confuse e misti. He who knew the name 
of Names which, as the Chaldaean oracles of old declared, " rushes into 
the infinite worlds," knew all things and had all power ; even in lesser 
words there lingered the fragrance of God and some re-echo of the Bath 
Kol — the Daughter of the Voice who was herself the last echo of the 
divine utterance. So it went down through the ages — coming, like 
Caesar's clay, to base uses — till we now find the sacred divination by 
words a child's play : only that and nothing more. 

Truly Mr. Bolton spoke well when he said that such reflection 
clothes these doggerels with a new and fascinating interest. Now and 
then some little thing awakens us to the days of old, the rosy, earlv 
morning of mankind, when the stars of magic were still twinkling in the 
sky, and the dreamer, hardly awake, still thought himself communing 
with God. So I was struck the other day when a gypsy, a deep and 
firm believer in the power of the amulet, and who had long sought, yet 
never found, his ideal, was deeply moved when I showed him the shell 
on which Nav, or the Name, was mystically inscribed by Nature. Through 
the occult and broken traditions of his tribe there had come to him 
also, perhaps from Indian or Chaldaean sources, some knowledge of the 
ancient faith in its power. 

I think that I can add to the instance of a child's counting-out 



GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. 221 

game based on a magic spell, yet another. Everybody knows the song 
of John Brown who had 

"Ten little, nine little, eight little, seven little, 
Six little Indian boys ; 

Five little, four little, three little, two little, 
One little Indian boy, 1 

And of the fate which overtook them all, one by one, inevitable as the 
decrees of Nemesis. This song is in action a game. I have heard it in 
Romany from a gypsy, and have received from a gypsy scholar another 
version of it, though I am sure that both were versions from the English. 
But in Romany, as in all languages, there have existed what may be 
called additional ,and subtractive magic songs, based on some primaeval 
Pythagorean principle of the virtues of numbers, and, as regards form, 
quite like that of the ten little Indians. In the charms of Marcellus 
Burdigalensis (third century), it appears as a cure for pains or 
disorders in the jaws (remedium valde certum et utile faucium doloribus\ 
in the Song of the Seven Acorn Sisters, which the Latin-Gaul doctor 
describes as carmen mirum, in which opinion the lover of Folk-lore will 

heartily concur. 

" Carmen mirum ad Glandulas. 

" Glandulas mane carminabis, si dies minuetur, si nox ad vesperam, et digito 
medicinali ac pollice continens eas dices :— 

" Novem glandulas sorores, 
Octo glandulae sorores, 
Septem glandulae sorores, 
Sex glandulas sorores, 
Quinque glandulae sorores, 
Quatuor glandulas sorores, 
Tres glandulas sorores, 
Duas glandulas sorores, 
Una glandula soror ! 



1 This song which, with its air, is very old in the United States, has been vul- 
garized by being turned into a ballad of ten little nigger boys. It is given in Mrs. 
Valentine's Nursery Rhymes as " Indian boys." 



GYPSY SORCERY. 

Novem fiunt glandula;, 
Octo fiunt glandulse, 
Septem fiunt glandulse, 
Sex fiunt glandulas, 
Quinque fiunt glandulas, 
Quattuor fiunt glandulse, 
Tres fiunt glandulae, 
Duse fiunt glandulse, 
Una fit glandula, 
Nulla fit glandula ! " 



{I.e., " Nine little acorn sisters (or girls), 
Eight little acorn sisters," &c.) 



This is simply the same count, forwards and backwards. 

It rises before us as we read — a chorus of rosy little Auluses and 
Marcellas, Clodias, and Manliuses, screaming in chorus : — 



" Ten little, nine little, eight little, seven little, 
Six little acorn girls ! " 



Until it was reduced to una glandula et nulla fit — " then there was 
none." They too had heard their elders repeat it as a charm against the 
jaw-ache — and can any man in his senses doubt that they applied it in 
turn to the divine witchcraft of fun and the sublime sorcery of sport, 
which are just as magical and wonderful in their way as anything in all 
theurgia or occultism, especially when the latter is used only to excite 
marvels and the amazement which is only a synonym for amusement. 
But it is not credible that such a palpable " leaving out " song as that of 
the Ten Little Acorn Girls should not having been utilized by such 
intelligent children as grew up into being the conquerors of the world 
— " knowing Latin at that." 

There is yet another old Roman " wonderful song to the Acorns," 
apparently for the same disorder, given by the same author. 



GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. 223 

" Albula glandula, 
Nee doleas nee noceas. 
Nee paniculas facias, 
Sed liquescas tanquam salis (mica) in aqua ! 

" Hoc ter novies dicens spues ad terram et glandulas ipsas pollice et digito medicinali 
perduces, dum carmen dices, sedante solis ortum et post occasum facies id, prout dies aut 
nox minuetur." 

There appears in these formulas to be either a confusion or affinity 
as regards glandulas, the tonsils, and the same word signifying small 
acorns. As is very often the case, the similarity of name caused an opinion 
that there must be sympathetic curative qualities. Perhaps acorns were 
also used in this ceremony. In a comment on this Grimm remarks : 
*- Die Glandula wird angeredet, die Glandule gelten fur Schwestern, wie 
wenn das alt hoch-deutsch druos glandula (Graff 5, 263) personification 
aukilndigte ? Alt Nordisch ist dros, femina." 

There is another child's rhyme which is self-evidently drawn from an 

exorcism, that is to say an incantation. All my readers know the nursery 

song :— 

" Snail, snail, come out of your hole, 
Or else I'll beat you as black as a coal ! 
Snail, snail, put out your head, 
Or else I'll beat you till you are dead ! " 

It is very remarkable that in Folk-lore the mole and the snail are 
identified, and, as De Gubernatis states, both are the same with the grey 
mouse, or, as he might more accurately have declared with the mouse in 
general. A critic objects to this simply because it occurs in the work of 
De Gubernatis, among his "fanciful theories," but it need not follow 
that every citation or opinion in his book is false. Friedrich, who 
certainly is not a fanciful theorist, asserted nearly thirty years ago that 
the mouse, owing to its living underground and in dark places as well as 
to its gnawing and destroying everything, is a chthonisches Thier, one of 
the animals of darkness and evil. Also " the mole, because it is of sub- 
terranean life, has received a chthonic, demoniac, misanthropic reputation." 



224 GYPSY SORCERY. 

In support of these statements he cites a great array of authorities. The 
connection between the mole and mouse is evident enough, that between 
both and the snail is also clear : firstly, from the fact that " the snail 
of popular superstition is demoniacal," or evil ; and secondly, from the 
rhyme which I now quote, which is applied to both moles and snails. 
According to Du Cange it was usual in the Middle Ages for children 
to go about carrying poles, on the ends of which was straw, which they 
lighted, and going round the gardens and under the trees shouted : — 

" Taupes et mulots, 
Sortez de vas clos, 
Sinon je vous brulerai la barbe et les os ! " 

But in Germany there are two and in Italy five versions of the same 
song addressed to snails. It is evidently a Roman Catholic formula, 
based on some early heathen incantation. Thus in Tuscany they sing : — 

" Chiocciola marinella 
Tira fuori le tue cornelle, 
E se tu non le tirerai 
Calcie pugni tu buscherai." 

Both the snail and mole and mouse -were, as I have said, chthonic, 
that is diabolical or of darkness. The horns of the former were supposed 
to connect it with the devil. " In Tuscany it is believed that in the 
month of April the snail makes love with serpents." 

There is another nursery counting-out rhyme whose antiquity and 
connection with sorcery is very evident. It is as follows : — 

" One, two, three, four, five, 
I caught a hare all alive. 
Six, seven, eight, nine ten, 
I let her go again." 

The following from the medical spells and charms of Marcellus 
Burdigalensis manifestly explains it : — 

" Lepori vivo talum abstrahes, pilosque ejus de subventre tolles atque ipsum 
vivum dimittes. De illis pilis, vel lana filum validum facies et ex eo talum leporis 



GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. 225 

conligabis corpusque laborantis prascinges ; miro remedio subvenies. Efficacius tamcn erit 
remedium, ita ut incredibile sit, si casu os ipsum, id est talum leporis in stercore lupi 
inveneris, quod ita custodire debes, ne aut terram tangat aut a muliere contingatur, sed 
nee filum illud de lana leporis debet mulier ulla contigere. Hoc autem remedium cum 
uni profuerit ad alias translatum cum volueris, et quotiens volueris proderit. Filum quoque, 
quod ex lana vel pilis, quos de ventre leporis tuleris, solus purus et nitidus facies, quod 
si ita ventri laborantis subligaveris plurimum proderit, ut sublata lana leporem vivum 
dimmittas, et dicas ei dum dimittis eum : 

" ' Fuge, fuge, lepuscule, et tecum aufer coli dolorem ! ' " 

That is to say, you must fC first catch your hare,'' then pluck 
from it the fur needed ad dolorem coli, then " let it go again," bidding 
it carry the disorder with it. In which the hare appears as a scape- 
goat. It may be observed that all this ceremony of catching the hare, 
letting it go and bidding it run and carry away the disorder, is still in 
familiar use in Tuscany. 

It has been observed to me that " any nursery rhyme may be used 
as a charm." To this we may reply that any conceivable human 
utterance may be taken for the same purpose, but this is an unfair special 
pleading not connected with the main issue. Mr. Carrington Bolton 
admits that he has only found one instance of coincidence between 
nursery rhymes and spells, and I have compared hundreds of both with 
not much more result than what I have here given. But those who are 
practically familiar with such formulas recognize this affinity. On asking 
the Florentine fortune-teller if she knew any children's counting-out 
rhymes which deemed to her to be the same with incantations, she at 
once replied : — 

" In witchcraft you sometimes call on people one by one by name 
to bewitch them. And the little girls have a song which seems to be 
like it." Then she sang to a very pretty tune : — 

" Ecco l'imbasciatore, 
Col tra le vi la Icra, 
Ecco l'imbasciatrice, 
Col tra la li ra la ! 
31 



22b GYPSY SORCERY. 

Cosa volete col tua la li la, 
Col tra le li va la, 
Voglio Giuseppina, 
Col tra le li va le va. 
Voglio la Cesarina, 

Col tra le li ra le : ra. 
Voglio la Armida, &c. 
Voglio la Gesualda, 
Voglio la Barbera, 
Voglio la Bianca, 
Voglio la Fortunata, 
Voglio la Uliva, 
Voglio la Filomena, 
Voglio la Maddalena, 
Voglio la Pia, 
Voglio la Gemma, 
Voglio la Ida, 
Voglio la Lorenzina, 
Voglio la Carolina, 
Voglio la Annunciatina, 
Voglio la Margo," &c. 

There is one thing of which those who deny the identity of any 
counting-out rhymes with spells are not aware. These incantations are 
very much in vogue with the Italian peasantry, as with the gypsies. 
They are repeated on all occasions for every disorder, for every trifle 
lost, for every want. Every child has heard them, and their jingle and 
even their obscurity make them attractive. They are just what children 
would be likely to remember and to sing over, and the applying them 
to games and to "counting-out" would follow as a matter of course. 
In a country where every peasant, servant-girl and child knows at least 
a few spells, the wonder would be if some of these were not thus popula- 
rized or perverted. It is one thing to sit in one's library and demonstrate 
that this or that ought not to be, because it is founded on a " theory " or 
" idea," and quite another to live among people where these ideas are in 
active operation. Washington Irving has recorded that one of the 
Dutch governors of New York achieved a vast reputation for wisdom by 



GYPSY MAGIC SPELL. 227 

shrugging his shoulders at everything and saying, " I have my doubts as 
to that." And truly the race of Wouter van Twiller is not extinct 
as yet by any means among modern critics. 

It is worth noting in this connection that in Mrs. Valentine's 
Nursery Rhymes (Camden edition) there are fifteen charms given which 
are all of a magical nature. 

Since the foregoing chapter was written I have obtained in Florence 
several additional instances of children's rhymes which were spells. 
Nearly allied to this subject of sorcery in the nursery is The Game of the 
Child-stealing Witch, which, as W. Wells Newell has shown in a very 
interesting and valuable contribution to the American Folk-Lore Journal, 
vol. iii., April, 1890, is found in many languages and lands. 

In connection with divination, deceit, and robbery, it may be observed 
that gypsies in Eastern Europe, as in India, often tell fortunes or answer 
questions by taking a goblet or glass, tapping it, and pretending to hear a 
voice in the ring which speaks to them. This method of divination is 
one of the few which may have occurred sporadically, or independently 
in different places, as there is so much in a ringing, vibrating sound 
which resembles a voice. The custom is very ancient and almost uni- 
versal ; so Joseph (Genesis xliv. 5) says ("Vulgate"), " Scyphus quam 
furati estis, ipse est, in quo bibit Dominus meus, et in quo augurari sokt." 
" The goblet which ye have stolen, is it not this wherein my lord 
drinketh and in which he is wont to divine?" Joseph says again (ver. 
15), "Know ye not that such a man as I can certainly divine." A 
great number of very orthodox scholars have endeavoured to show that 
"divine" here means merely "to conjecture wisely," or "to see into," in 
order to clear Joseph from the accusation of fortune-telling : but the cup 
and his interpretation of dreams tell another story. In those days in the 
East, as now, clever men made their way very often by fortune-telling 
and theurgia in different forms in great families, just as ladies and, 
gentlemen are "invited out" in London and Paris to please the company 
with palmistry. 



228 GYPSY SORCERY. 

This divining by goblets is still common in the East. In Norden's 
<c Reise nach Egypten," &c, we are told that a native said to the travellers 
that he had interrogated his coffee-cup, and it had replied that the travellers 
were those of whom the Prophet had predicted they would come as spies and 
lead the way for a great immigration of Franks. In an Arabic commentary 
of the twelfth century the replies which the goblet gave to Joseph when it 
tapped on it are given in full. As coffee-drinking is very ancient it is probable 
that divination by means of the grounds grew out of foretelling with the cup. 

Horst ("Daemonomagie," vol. ii.) remarks that "prediction by means 
of drinking or coffee-cups," &c, is called in magic, Scyphomancy, and that 
the reader may judge how common it was in Germany in the first half of 
the eighteenth century by consulting the famous humorous poem of the 
*' Renomist," Song iii. ver. 47. Certain goblets of thin glass will give out 
quite a loud ring if only blown upon, and by blowing or breathing in a 
peculiar way the sound may be greatly increased or modified, so as to sound 
like the human voice. This was shown me by an old custode in the museum 
at the Hague. It is a curious trick worth trying — especially by those who 
would pass for magicians ! 

There is yet another kind of magic cup known only by tradition, the 
secret of which, I believe, I was the first to re-discover. It is said that 
the Chinese knew of old how to make bottles, &c, which appeared to be 
perfectly plain, but on which, when filled with wine, inscriptions or figures 
appeared, and which were used in divination as to answer questions. In 
the winter of 1886-87, Sir Henry Austin La yard went with me 
through his glass factory at Venice. 1 As we were standing by the 
furnace watching the workmen it flashed upon me quite in a second 
how the mysterious old goblets of the Chinese could be made. This 
would be by blowing a bottle, &c, of thin white glass and putting on 
the interior in all parts except the pattern, a coating of glass half an inch 
in thickness. The outside should then be lightly ground, to conceal the 

1 It is not generally known that Sir H. A. Layard and Sir William Drake were the true 
revivers of the glass manufacture of Venice. 



G YPS Y MA GIC SPELL. 



229 



heavy portion. If red wine or any dark fluid should then be poured 
into the bottle the pattern would appear of the same colour. Sir Austin 
Layard at once sent for his very intelligent foreman, Signor Castellani, 
who said that he had indeed read of such goblets, but that he regarded 
it as a fable. But when I explained to him what had occurred to me, he 
said that it was perfectly possible, but that the great expense of making 
such objects would probably make the manufacture practically impossible. 
Apropos of which I may mention that those who would investigate the 
curiosities of glass, especially the art of making it malleable, may find a great 
deal in A. Nevi, " De Arte Vitraria" (Amsterdam), and its German 
translation of 1678 (which contains a chapter, "Wie die Malleabilitat dem 
Glase beygebracht werden konne "). 

It is probable that the celebrated cup of Djemschid, in Persian story, 
which showed on its surface all that passed in the world, owed its origin 
to these Chinese bottles. 





CHAPTER XV. 

GYPSY AMULETS. 

Knew many an amulet and charm 
Which would do neither good nor harm, 
In Rosicrucian lore as learned 
As he that vere adeptus earned." — Hudibras. 



s^ 




?4 g~ ~- ITH pleasant plausibility 
Heine has traced the 
origin of one kind of 
fairy-lore to the asso- 
ciations and feelings 
which we form for 
familiar objects. A 
coin, a penknife, a 
pebble, which has long 
been carried in the 
pocket or worn by any 
one, seems to become 
imbued with his or her 
personality. If it could speak, we should expect to hear from it an 



GYPSY AMULETS. 231 

echo of the familiar voice of the wearer ; as happened, indeed, in Thuringia 
in the year 1562, when a fair maid, Adelhait von Helbach, was carried 
into captivity by certain ill-mannered persons. " Now her friends, pur- 
suing, knew not whither to go, when they heard her voice, albeit very 
small and feeble, calling to them ; and, seeking, they found in the bush 
by the road a silver image of the Virgin, which she had worn : and 
this image told them which road to take. Following the direction, they 
recovered her ; the Raubritter who bore her away being broken on the 
wheel, and the image hung up for the glory of the Virgin, who had 
spoken by it, in the Church of our Lady of Kalbrunn." Again, these 
objects have such strange ways of remaining with one that we end by 
suspecting that they have a will of their own. With certain persons 
these small familiar friends become at last fetishes, which bring luck, 
giving to those who firmly believe in them great comfort and endurance 
in adversity. 

Who has not been amazed at the persistency with which some button 
or pebble picked up, or placed perchance in the pocket, remains in all 
the migrations of keys and pencils and coins, faithful to the charge ? 
How some card or counter will lurk in our pocket-book (misnamed 
" purse ") or porte-monnaie, until it becomes clear as daylight that it 
has a reasonable intelligence, and stays with us because it wants to. As 
soon as this is recognized — especially by some person who is accustomed 
to feel mystery in everything, and who doubts nothing — the object 
becomes something which knows, possibly, a great deal which we do not. 
Therefore it is to be treated with care and respect, and in due time it 
becomes a kind of god, or at least the shrine of a small respectable 
genius, or fairy. I have heard of a gentleman in the Western United 
States who had a cane in which, as he seriously believed, a spirit had 
taken up its abode, and he reverenced it accordingly. The very ancient 
and widely-spread belief in the efficiency of magic wands probably came 
from an early faith in such implements as had been warranted to have 
magic virtues as weapons, or to aid a pedestrian in walking. Hence it 



232 GYPSY SORCERY. 

happened that swords which had been enchanted, or which had taken lives, 
were supposed to have some indwelling intelligence. Hence also the 
names given to swords, and indeed to all weapons, by the Norsemen. It 
was believed that the sword of an executioner, after it had beheaded a 
certain number of men, pined for more victims, and manifested its desire 
by unearthly rattling or ringing. Apropos of which I have in my possession 
such a gruesome implement, which if experience in death could give it 
life, or make it ring in the silent watches of the night, would be a ghastly, 
noisy guest indeed. I once told the story in " The Gypsies " (Boston, 
1881) — now I have something to add to it. I had met in London with 
an Indian gypsy named Nano, who informed me that in India he had 
belonged to a wandering tribe or race who called themselves Rom, or 
Romani, who spoke Romani jib, and who were the Gypsies of the Gypsies. 
I have in my possession a strange Hindu knife with an enormously 
broad blade, six inches across towards the end, with a long handle richly 
mounted in bronze with a little silver. I never could ascertain till I 
knew Nano what it had been used for. Even the old king of Oude, 
when he examined it, went wrong and was uncertain. Not so the gypsy. 
When he was in my library, and his keen black eyes rested on it, he 
studied it for a moment, and then said : "I know well enough that 
knife. I have seen it before ; it is very old, and it was long in use — it 
was the knife used by the public executioner in Bhotan. It is Bhotanl." 
Nano had volunteered the explanation, and whatever his moral 
character might be, he was not given to romantic invention. Time 
passed, I went to America, stayed there four years, and returned. In 
1888 I became a member of the National Association for the Advancement 
of Art, and was on the Central Committee. One day we had a meeting 
at the house of a distinguished architect. When it was over, my host 
showed me his many treasures of art, or archaeology. While examining 
these, my attention was attracted by an Indian knife. It was precisely like 
mine, but smaller. I asked what it was, and learned that it had long 
been used in some place in the East for the express purpose of sacri- 



GYPSY AMULETS. 233 

ficing young girls. And in all respects it was what we might call 
the feminine counterpart of my knife. And if I ever had any lingering 
doubt as to the accuracy of Nano's account, it disappeared when I saw 
the one whose history was perfectly authentic. A few years ago in 
Heidelburg there were sold at auction a great number of executioners' 
swords, some of which had been used for centuries. A gentleman who 
had a special fondness for this kind of bric-a-brac, had for many years 
collected them. 

It may be here observed that the knife forms a special feature in 
all witch-lore, and occurs frequently among the Hungarian and Italian 
gypsy charms, or spells. It is sometimes stuck into a table, while a spell 
is muttered, protesting that it is not the wood which one wishes to hurt, 
but the heart of an enemy. Here the knife is supposed in reality to 
have an indwelling spirit which will pass to the heart or health of the 
one hated. In Tarn O'Shanter there is a knife on the witches' table, 
and in Transylvania, as in Tuscany, a new knife, not an old one, is used 
in divers ceremonies. Sometimes an old and curious knife becomes an 
amulet and is supposed to bring luck, although the current belief is that 
any pointed gift causes a quarrel. 

But to return to the fetish or pocket-deity which is worn in so many 
forms, be they written scrolls, crosses, medals or relics — cdst tout un. 
Continental gypsies are notable believers in amulets. Being in a camp 
of very wild Cigany in Hungary a few years ago, I asked them 
what they wore for bakt, or luck ; whereupon they all produced small 
seashells, which I was assured were potent against ordinary misfortunes. 
But for a babe which was really ill they had provided an " appreciable " 
dose in the form of three Maria Theresa silver dollars, which were 
hung round its neck, but hidden under its clothes. And I may here 
remark that all through many lands, even into the heart of Africa, 
this particular dollar is held in high esteem for magical purposes. 
From one to another the notion has been transferred, and travellers and 
traders are often puzzled to know why the savages will have no coin 

32 



234 GYFSY SORCERY. 

save this. From Russia to the Cape it is the same story, and one to be 
specially studied by those ethnologists who do not believe in transmission, 
and hold that myths and legends are of local growth and accounted for 
by similar local conditions. 

The gypsies were very desirous to know what my charm was. 
Fortunately I had in my pocket a very fine fossil shark's tooth which I 
had purchased in Whitby, and this was greatly admired by the learned 
of the tribe. Mindful of good example, I obtained for myself specimens 
of the mystic shells, foreseeing that they would answer as passes and signs 
among the fraternity in Germany and elsewhere. Which, indeed, came 
to pass a few days ago in the town of Homburg, when looking from my 
window in the Schwedenpfad I saw two very honest-looking gypsies go 
by. Walking forth, I joined them, and led them into a garden, where 
over beer and cigars we discussed " the affairs of Egypt." These 
Romanys were from the Tyrol, and had the frank bold manner of the 
mountain-men blended with the natural politeness of the better class of 
gypsy. I had taken with me in my pocket, foreseeing its use, a small bag 
or purse, containing an assortment of objects such as would have puzzled 
anybody except a Red Indian, a negro, or any believer in medaolin or 
Voodoo, or my new acquaintance ; and after a conversation on durkepen 
(in Anglo-gypsy, dukkerin) or fortune-telling, I asked the men what they 
wore. They wished to see my amulets first. So I produced the shells ;. 
which were at once recognized and greatly admired, especially one, which 
is something of a curiosity, since in its natural markings is the word 
NAV very plainly inscribed : Nav, in gypsy, meaning "the name."' 
The elder gypsy said he had no charm ; he had long been seeking a 
good one, but had not as yet met with the correct article. And then 
he begged me — gracious powers, how he did beg ! — to bestow on him 
one of my shells. I resolved to do so — but at another time. 

The younger gypsy, who was a pasche-paskero, a musician, and had 
with him a rare old violin in a wonderfully carved wooden case at least 
two centuries old, was " all right " on the fetish question. He had his. 



G YPS Y AMULE TS. 235 

shell, sewn up in a black leather bag, which he wore by a cord round 
•his neck. Then I exhibited my small museum. Every object in it was 
carefully and seriously examined. My shark's tooth was declared to be 
a very good fetish, a black pebble almost equal to the shell, and an 
American Indian arrow-head of quartz passed muster as of possible though 
somewhat doubtful virtue. But an English sixpence with a hole in it 
was rejected as a very petty and contemptible object. I offered it in 
vain as a present to my friends : thev would not accept it. Neither 
did they want money : my dross might perish with me. It was the 
shell — the precious beautiful little shell on which the Romany in search 
of a fetish had set his heart ; the shell which would bring him luck, 
and cause him to be envied, and ensure him admiration in the tents of 
the wanderers from Paris to Constantinople. He admitted that it was 
the very shell of shells — a baro sercskeri sharkuni, or famous sea-snail. 
I believe the gypsies would have given me their fine old Stainer violin 
and the carved case for it. Failing to get the shell, he implored me to 
give him the black pebble. I resolved to give him both in free gift 
the next time we met, or as a parting souvenir. Alas for the Romany 
chal ! — we never met again. The police allow no gypsies in Homburg, 
and so they had to move on. I sought them that night and I sought 
them next day ; but they were over the hills and far away. But I 
have no doubt that the fame of the shell on which Nature has written 
the Name — the very logos of magic itself — spread ere the summer was 
past even to the Carpathians. Something tells me that it is not played 
out yet, and that I shall hear anon something regarding it. 

The cult of the shell is widely spread. One day in a public- 
house, in the West End of London, I, while taking my glass of bitter, 
entered into conversation with a rather tall, decently-attired brunette 
Alsatian girl, who spoke French and German, and who knew a few 
words of Romany, which she said she had picked up by acccident — at 
least she professed not to be gypsy, and to know no more. Being 
minded to test the truth of this, I casually exhibited one of my shells 



236 GYPSY SORCERY. 

and said it was a Hungarian gypsy amulet for la bonne fortune. She 
began to beg earnestly for it, without getting it. On several occasions 
at long intervals, when I met her in the street, she again implored me 
for the treasure, saying that she believed " if she had it, her luck would 
turn to ;good." And, being convinced of her gypsyism, I said, " It will 
do you no -good unless you have faith." To which she replied, in a 
tone which indicated truth itself: "But I have faith — absolute, entire 
faith in it." Which seeing, and finding that she was a true convert 
to the power of the holy shell, I gave it to her with my blessing, 
knowing that it would be a joy and comfort to her in all the trials 
of life. 

This reminds me that I have seen, and indeed possess, a pearl- 
shell bearing the image of Saint Francis of Assisi, such as is sold by 
thousands at his shrine, and which are supposed to possess certain 
miraculous innate or intrinsic virtues. Thus, if worn by children, they 
are a cure for croup. " Ah — but that is a very different thing, you 
know." 

An idol is an object, generally an image, worshipped for its own 
sake — being supposed to not only represent a god, but to have some 
immanent sanctity. The Catholic priest, and for that matter all 
Brahmins or bonzes, assure us that their sacred images are " only 
symbols, not regarded as really dwelling-places of divinity." They are 
not, so to speak, magnified amulets. Yet how is it that, if this be true, 
so many images and pictures are regarded and represented by priests as 
being able of themselves by the touch to cure tooth-ache, and all other 
ills which flesh and bones are heirs to. Why is one image especially 
good for tooth-ache, while another of the same person cures cramp? 
Why, if they are all only " symbols," is one more healing or holy 
than another ? How can our Lady of Embrun be of greater aid than 
our Lady of Paris? The instant we ascribe to an image or a shell real 
power to act, we make of it an inspired being in itself, and all the 
sophistry in the world as to its being a means of faith, or a symbol, or 



G YPS Y AMULE TS 237 

causing a higher power to act on the suppliant, is rubbish. The devotee 
believes tout bonnement that the image works the cure, and if he did not, 
any other image of the Virgin or Saint would answer the same purpose. 
This chaff has been thrashed out a thousand times — or many tens of 
thousand times in vain,— as vain so far as effects go as is the remark- 
ably plain First Commandment. And it will last, while one fetish 
endures, that the hierophant will call it a mere " symbol," and the 
ignorant worshipper, absolutely unable to comprehend him, will worship 
the symbol as the thing itself — as he is really expected to do. 

According to J. B. Friedrich, " Symbolik der Natur," the sea- 
shell, on account of its being a product of the sea, or of the all- 
generating moisture ; and much more probably from its shape, is an 
emblem of woman herself. Therefore as " Venus, Love's goddess, was 
born of the sea," shells are dedicated to her. (" Museo Bourbonico," 
vol. vi. p. 10. Kugler, " Handbuch Geschichte der Malerei," Berlin, 
1837, vol. iv. p. 311. Also translated by Sir H. Austin La yard). 
Being one of the great emblems of productive Nature, or of life and 
light, and opposed to barrenness, absence of pleasure, darkness, or nega- 
tion, it was of course a charm against witchcraft or evil. That the 
gypsies have retained it as a powerful agent for " luck," is extremely 
interesting, showing to what a degree they are still influenced by the 
early symbolism which effectively formed not one but many mytholo- 
gies. Among the Hungarian gypsies the virtue or magical power of 
a shell is in proportion to the degree of resemblance above mentioned, 
which it possesses, as Wlislocki expressly declares. 

This association of shells, with the mysterious and magical, is to 
be found among gypsies in the East, as is shown by the following : 
from my work entitled "The Gypsies." It describes something which i 
saw many times in Cairo : — 

"Beyond the door which, when opened, gave this sight, was a dark, ancient 
archway, twenty yards long, which opened on the glaring, dusty street, where camels 
with their drivers, and screaming sa'is or carriage-runners and donkey-boys and crying 



238 GYPSY SORCERY. 

venders kept up the wonted Oriental din. But in the archway, in its duskiest corner, 
there sat in silence and immovable, a living picture — -a dark, handsome woman, of 
thirty years, who was unveiled. She had before her on the gateway floor, a square of 
cloth and a few shells. Sometimes an Egyptian of the lower class stopped, and there 
would be a grave consultation. She was a fortune-teller, and from the positions which 
the shells assumed when thrown she predicted what would come to pass. And then 
there would be a solemn conference and a thoughtful stroking of the beard, if the 
applicant was a man, and then the usual payment to the oracle, and a departure. 
And it was all world-old primaeval Egyptian, as it was Chaldaaan, for the woman was 
a Rhagarin, or gypsy, and as she sat so sat the diviners of ancient days by the wayside, 
casting shells for auspices, even as arrows were cast of old, to be cursed by Israel. 

"It is not remarkable that among the myriad manteias of olden days there should 
have been one by shells. The sound of the sea when heard in a nautilus or conch 
is marvellously "like that of ocean surges murmuring far." 

" Shake me and it awakens — then apply 
Its polished lips to your attentive ear, 
And it remembers its august abodes 
And murmurs as the ocean murmurs there." 

All of this is very strange to children and not less so to all 
unsophisticated folk, and I can remember how in boyhood I was told 
and listened with perfect faith to the distant roaring, and marvelled at 
the mystery of the ocean song being thus for ev^er kept alive inland. 
The next step to this is to hear in the sea-murmuring something like 
voices, and this is as curious as it is true — that if the mind be earnestly 
given to it, and the process be continued for a long time during several 
days, many persons, and probably all in time, will come to distinguish or 
hear human utterances and eventually words. There is no special faith 
required here ; the mind even of the most sceptical or unimaginative will 
often turn back on itself, and by dint of mere perseverance produce such 
effects. An old pitcher or jug of a peculiar shape is also declared to be 
admirably adapted for this purpose, and I have one of Elizabeth's time 
which was trawled up from the sea near Lowestoft which would fulfil 
every requisition. 

In 1886 I was by moonlight in a camp of gypsies in the old Roman 
amphitheatre near Budapest. It was a very picturesque sight, what with 



GYPSY AMULETS. 239 

the blazing fire, the strangely-dressed men, the wild shrieking, singing, and 
dancing women. And when, as I have before mentioned, they showed 
me the shells which they carried for amulets, they exhibited one much 
larger of conch-like form, the tip of which had been removed and to 
which there was attached a flexible tube. This was used in a very remark- 
able trick. The shell, or one like it, is put into the hands of the person 
consulting the oracle, who is directed to listen to the voice of the Nivashi, 
or spirit of the air. Then he is blindfolded, the tube applied, and through 
it the gypsy speaks in a trained soft voice. Thus, in conchomanteia, the 
oracles still live and devotees still hear the fairies talk. 

Now, be it observed that hearing is the most deceptive of the senses 
— as the reader may have seen exemplified by a lecturer, when the audience 
were persuaded that he was fiddling on one cane with another, or blowing 
a flute tune on one, when the music was made by a confederate behind 
a screen. I myself, a few days since, when in the Koppern Thai, verily 
believed I heard the murmur and music of children's voices — when lo ! 
it proved to be the babbling brook. Some years ago — I forget where it 
happened in England, but I guarantee the truth of what I tell — it was 
found that the children in a certain village were in the habit of going to 
an ancient tomb in which there was a round hole, putting their ears to 
it, and, as they said, of listening to what the dead people were saying. 
It is facile enough to understand that among them there would be some 
whose unconscious creative faculty would lead them to literally hearing 
words or songs. There is another ancient and beautiful mystical association 
with shells. The conch when pierced formed a trumpet, whose notes 
seemed to be allied to the murmuring of the wind and waves heard in 
the shell when applied to the ear. The sea-god Triton blew upon a 
shell — " meaning thereby the roaring of the waves." " And in analogous 
wise a shell is represented on the Tower of the Winds in Athens, to 
represent Boreas, the north-east wind, and the roaring of the storm " 
(Millin, " Gallerie Mythologique "). The resemblance of wind to the 
human voice has probably occurred to every human being, and has furnished 



2 4 o GYPSY SORCERY. 

similes for every poet. That these voices should be those of spirits is a 
natural following. So the last Hebrew oracle, the Bath Kol, or Daughter 
of the Voice, survives in shells and lives in gypsy-lore. And so we find 
in rags and patches on the garments of Egyptian fellahin the edges of 
Pharaoh's garment, which in olden time it was an honour for kings to 
kiss. 

Deception of this kind by means of voices, apparently supernatural, is of 
great antiquity. The high priest Savan the Asmunian, of Egypt, is said to 
have used acoustic tubes for this purpose, and it is very evident that the long 
corridors or passages in the stone temples must have suggested it as well as 
whispering galleries. The Hebrew Cabalists are believed to have made one 
form of the mysterious Teraphim by taking the head of a child and so pre- 
paring it by magic ceremonies that when interrogated it would reply. These 
ceremonies consisted in fact of skilfully adjusting a phonetic tube to the head. 
It is very probable that the widely-spread report of this oracle gave rise to the 
belief that the Jews slaughtered and sacrificed children. " Eliphaz Levi," or 
the Abbe Constant, a writer of no weight whatever as an authority, but not 
devoid of erudition, and with occasional shrewd insights, gives it as his 
belief that the terrible murders of hundreds of children by Gilles de Retz — 
the absurdly so-called original of Blue-beard — were suggested by a recipe for 
sanguinary sorcery, drawn from some Hebrew Cabalistical book. Nicephorus 
(Lib. 7 c. 23) an d Cedrenus, as cited by Grosius in his " Magica" (1597), tell 
us that when Constantine was ill a number of children were collected to be 
slain that the emperor might bathe in their blood (in quo si se Imperator 
ablueret, certo recwperaret)> and that because he was moved by the tears of 
their mothers to spare their lives, was restored to health by the saints. It seems 
to have escaped the attention of writers that at the very time during the 
Middle Ages when the Jews were being most bitterly persecuted for 
offering children at the Passover, it was really a common thing among 
Christians to sacrifice children, maids, or grown-up people, by burying 
them alive under the foundations of castles, &c, to insure their stability — 
a ghastly sacrifice, which in after-times took the form of walling-up a 



GYPSY AMULETS. 241 

cock and finally an egg. But from an impartial and common-sense 
standpoint, there could be no difference between the sacrifice of a child 
by a Cabalist and the torturing and burning witches and heretics by 
ecclesiastics, unless, indeed, that the latter was the wickeder of the two, 
since the babes were simply promptly killed, while the Inquisitors put their 
victims to death with every refinement of mental and physical torture. Both 
Cabalist and priest were simply engaged in different forms of one and the 
same fetish-work which had been handed down from the days of witch- 
craft. Nor did Calvin, when he burnt Servetus, differ in anything from a 
Voodoo sacrificing " a goat without horns." 

Punishing a heretic to please or placate the Deity differs in nothing 
from killing any victim to get luck. Other sentiments may be mingled 
with this " conjuring," but the true foundation of black witchcraft (and 
all witchcraft is black which calls for blood, suffering, starvation, and the 
sacrifice of natural instincts), is the mortar of the fear of punishment, and 
the stones of the hope of reward, the bulk of the latter being immeasurably 
greater than that of the former, which is a mere Bindemittel, or means of 
connection. 

It is remarkable that nowhere, not even in England, do the gypsies 
regard the witch as utterly horrible, diabolical, and damnable. She is with 
them simply a woman who has gained supernatural power, which she 
uses for good or misuses for evil according to her disposition. The 
witch of the Church — Catholic or Protestant — when closely examined is 
a very childish conception. She sets forth personal annoyance without 
any regard whatever as to whether it is really good in disguise or a 
natural result of our own follies. Thus witches caused thunder-storms, 
which, because they were terrifying and more or less destructive, were 
seriously treated by the Church as unmitigated evils, therefore as phenomena 
directly due to the devil and his servants. Theology the omniscient did 
not know that storms cleared the air. Witches were responsible for all 
pestilences, and very often for all disorders of any kind — as it was very 
convenient for the ignorant leech to attribute to sorcery or moral delinquency 

33 



242 GYPSY SORCERY. 

or to God, a disease which he could not cure. For " Theology, the science 
of sciences," had not as yet ascertained that plagues and black deaths, 
and most of the ills of man are the results of neglect of cleanliness, 
temperance, and other sanitary laws. It is only a few years since a very 
eminent clergyman and president of a college in America attributed to 
" Divine dispensation " the deaths of a number of students, which were 
directly due to palpable neglect of proper sanitary arrangements by the 
reverend gentleman himself, and his colleagues. But, admitting the 
" divine dispensation," according to the mediaeval theory, the president, as 
the agent, must have been a " wizard " — or conjuror — a delusion which the 
most superficial examination of his works would at once dissipate. But 
to return — there can be no denial whatever that according to what is 
admitted to be absolutely true to-day by everybody, be he orthodox or 
liberal, witches, had they existed, must have been agents of God, busied 
in preventing plagues instead of causing them — by raising storms which 
cleared the air. Even the Algonkin Indians knew more than the Church 
in this respect, for they have a strange old legend to the effect that when 
the god of Storms, Wuch-ow-sen, the giant eagle, was hindered by a 
magician from his accustomed work, the sea and air grew stagnant, and 
people died. 1 The witch was simply another form of the Hebrew Azrael, 
God's Angel of Death. 

Which may all lead to the question : If a belief in witches as utterly 
evil servants of the devil could be held as an immutable dogma of the 
Church and a matter of eternal truth for eternal belief — to prove which 
there is no end of ingenious argument and an appalling array of ecclesi- 
astical authority cited in the black-letter "Liber de Sortilegiis" of Paulus 
Grillandus, now lying before me (Lyons, 1547), as well as in the works 
of Sprenger, Bodinus, Delrio, and the Witch-bull of Pope Innocent — and 
if this belief be now exploded even among the priests, what proof have we 
that any of the dogmas which went with it are absolutely and for ever true ? 
This is the question of dogmatik, versus development or evolution, and witch- 
1 See the " Algonkin Legends of New England," by Charles G. Leland. 



GYPSY AMULETS. 243 

craft is its greatest solvent. For when people believe, or make believe, 
in a thing so very much as to torture like devils and put to death 
hundreds of thousands of fellow-beings, mostly helpless and poor old 
women, not to mention many children, it becomes a matter of very 
serious import to all humanity to determine once for all whether the 
system or code according to which this was done was absolutely right 
for ever, or not. For if it was true, these executions and the old theory 
of witchcraft were all quite right, as the Roman Church still declares, since 
the Pope has sanctioned of late years several very entertaining works 
in which modern spiritualists, banjo-twangers, table-turners, &c, are 
declared to be really wizards, who perform their stupendous and appalling 
miracles directly by the aid of devils. And, by the way, somebody might 
make an interesting work not only on the works in the Index Librum 
Prohibitorum, which it entails seventy-six distinct kinds of damnation 
to read, but also on those which the Pope sanctions — I believe, blesses. 
Among the later of the latter is one which pretends to prove that Jews 
do really still continue to sacrifice Christian children at the Passover 
feast — and, for aught I know, to eat them, fried in oil, or " buttered 
with goose-grease " — apropos of which, I marvel that the Hebrews, instead 
of tamely denying it, do not boldly retort on the Christians the charge 
of torturing their own women and children to death as witches, which 
was a thousand times wickeder than simply bleeding them with a pen- 
knife, as young Hugh of Lincoln was said to have been disposed of by the 
Jew's daughter. 

But people all say now — that was the age, and the Church was still 
under the influence of barbarism, and so on. Exactly ; but that admission 
plainly knocks down and utterly destroys the whole platform of dogma- 
tism and the immutable and eternal truth of any dogma whatever, for 
it admits evolution — and to seize on its temporary fleeting forms and 
proclaim that they are immutable, is to mistake the temporal for the 
eternal, the infinitesimal fraction for the whole. This is not worshipping 
God, the illimitable, unknown tremendous Source of Life, but His minor 



244 GYPSY SORCERY. 

temporary forms, " essences," or " angels," as the Cabalists termed the 
successive off-castings of His manifestations. 

In Being's flood, in action's storm 
I work and weave — above, beneath, 
Work and weave in endless motion 
Birth and death, an infinite ocean 

A seizing and giving 

The fire of the living. 
'Tis thus at the roaring loom of Time I ply 
And weave for God the garment thou seest Him by. 

Now there are infinite numbers of these garments, but none of 
them are God, though the Church declared that what they had of them 
were truly Divine. So Oriental princes sent their old clothes to distant 
provinces to be worshipped, as Gessler sent his hat : tit is an old, old 
story, and one which will be long repeated in many lands. 

I have, not far back, mentioned a work on witchcraft by Paulus 
Grill an dus. Its full title is " Traciatus de Hereticis et sortilegiis, omni- 
fariam Coitio eorumque penis. Item de Shiestionibus et Tortura ac de 
Relaxatione Carceratormn'" — that is, in brief, a work on Heretics, Witches 
breakers of the Seventh Commandment of all kinds, Examination by 
Torture, and Imprisonment. It was a leading vade mecum^ or standard 
guide, in its time for lawyers and the clergy, especially the latter, and 
reads as if it had come from the library of hell, and been written by 
a devil, though composed, according to the preface, to promote the 
dignity and glory of the Christian Church. I can well believe that a 
sensitive humane person could be really maddened by a perusal and full 
comprehension of all the diabolical horrors which this book reveals, and the 
glimpses which it gives of what must have been endured literally by millions 
of heretics and " witches," and all men or women merely accused by anybody 
of any kind of "immorality," especially of "heresy." I say suspected or 
accused — for either was sufficient to subject a victim to horrible agonies 
until he or she confessed. What is most revolting is the calm, icy-cold- 



GYPSY AMULETS. 245 

blooded manner in which the most awful, infernal cruelties are carefully 
discussed — as, for instance, if one has already had any limbs amputated 
for punishment whether further tortures may then be inflicted? It is 
absolutely a relief to find that among the six kinds of persons legally 
exempted from the rack, &c. — there are only six and these do not include 
invalids — are pregnant women. But such touches of common humanity 
are rare indeed in it. I do not exaggerate in the least when I say that 
the whole spirit of this work — which faithfully reflects the whole spirit 
of the "justice" of the Middle Ages — inclines in a ferocious, wolfish 
manner to extend and multiply punishment of the most horrible kinds to 
every small offence against the Church — to manufacture and increase 
crime as if it were capital for business, and enlarge the sphere of torture 
so as to create power and awe. 

Nous avons change tout cela, say the descendants of those fiends in 
human form. But if it was wrong then why did you do it if you 
were infallible inspired judges? And if you now believe that to be 
atrocious which was once holy, and a vast portion of your whole system, 
how can you say that the Church does not follow the laws of evolution 
.and progress — and if so, where will it stop ? It is a curious reflection that 
if the Pope and Cardinals of 1890 had lived four hundred years ago they 
would (with the exception, perhaps, of the Spaniards) have all been burned 
alive for heresy. Which is literallv true. 

Within a minute's walk from where I sit, and indeed visible from 
my window in this town of Homburg vor der Hohe, are two round 
towers of other days — grim and picturesque relics of the early Middle 
Ages. One is called the Hexenthurm or Witches' Tower. In it 
gypsies, witches, and heretics were confined — it was the hotel specially 
reserved for them when they visited Homburg, and in its cells which 
are of the smallest between walls of the thickest, I or you, reader, 
might be confined to-day, but for one Martin Luther and certain 
laws of evolution or progress of which Paulus Grillandus did not 
dream. 



246 GYPSY SORCERY 

As I was sketching the tower, an old woman told me that there- 
were many strange tales about it. That I can well believe but I dare 

■ana 




say they are all summed up in the following ballad from the German 
of Heine : — 

"The Witch." 

" Folks said when my granny Eliza bewitched, 
She must die for her horrid transgression ; 
Much ink from his pen the old magistrate pitched, 
But he could not extort a confession. 

And when in the kettle my granny was thrown 
She yelled 'Death' and 'Murder!' while dying; 

And when the black smoke all around us was blown, 
As a raven she rose and went flying. 

Little black grandmother, feathered so well, 

Oh, come to the tower where I'm sitting : 
Bring cakes and bring cheese to me here in the cell, 

Through the iron-barred window flitting. 

Little black grandmother, feathered and wise, 

Just give my aunt a warning, 
Lest she should come flying and pick out my eyes 

When I merrily swing in the morning." 

Horst in his " Daemonomagie," a History of the Belief in Magic r 
Demoniac marvels, Witchcraft, &c, gives the picture of a Witch-tower,, 
at Lindheim in the Wetterau, with all its terrible history, extracted from 
the town archives. It is a horrible history of torturing and burning at 
the stake of innumerable women of all ages, the predominant feature 



GYPSY AMULETS. 247 

being that any accusation by anybody whatever, or any rumour set afloat 
in any way, amply sufficed to bring an enemy to death, or to rob a person 
who had money. Hysterical women and perverse or eccentric children 
frequently originated these accusations merely to bring themselves into notice. 

There was till within a few years a Witches' Tower in Heidelberg. 
It was a very picturesque structure in an out-of-the-way part of the 
town, in nobody's way, and was therefore of course pulled down by the 
good Philistine citizens, who have the same mania in Heidelberg as 
" their ignorant-like " in London, Philadelphia, or any other town, for 
removing all relics of the olden time. 

In connection with sorcery and gypsies, it is worth observing that 
in 1834 the latter, in Swabia, or South Germany, frequently went about 
among the country-people, with puppet-shows, very much of the Punch 
kind, and that they had a rude drama of Faust, the great wizard, which 
had nothing to do with that of Goethe. It was derived from the early 
sources, and had been little by little gypsified into a melodrama peculiar 
to the performers. August Zoller, in his " Bilder aus Schwaben " (Stutt- 
gard, 1834), gives the following description of it. The book has a place 
in all Faust libraries, and has been kept alive by this single passage : — 

"There is a blast of a trumpet, and the voice of a man proclaims behind the scenes 
that the play is to begin. The curtain is drawn, and Faust leaning against the back- 
ground — which represents a city — soliloquizes : 

"'I am the cleverest doctor in the world, but all my cleverness does not help me 
to make the beautiful princess love me. I will call up Satan from the under-world to 
aid me in my plans to win her. Devil — I call thee !' 

" Meanwhile Faust's servant — the funny man — has entered and amused the public 
with comical gestures. The appearance of the devil is announced by a firework (Spruh- 
teufel) fizzing and cracking. He descends from the air, there being no arrangements for 
his coming up. The servant bursts into a peal of laughter, and the devil asks : 

" ' Faust thou hast called me ; now, what is thy wish ? ' 

"'I love the lovely princess — canst thou make her love me?' 

" ' Nothing is easier. Cut thy finger and sign to me thy life \ then all my devilish 
art will be at thy service till thou hast committed four murders.' 

"Faust and the devil fly forth, the servant making sarcastic remarks as to the folly 
of his master, and the curtain falls. 



248 GYPSY SORCERY. 

"In the second act the fair princess enters- — she is three times as large as Faust, 
but bewails his absence in a plaintive voice and departs. Faust enters and calls for a 
Furio who shall carry him to Mantua. Enter three Furios (witches) who boast their 
power. ' I can carry you as swiftly as a moor-cock flies,' says one. This is not swift 
enough for Faust. 'I fly as fast as bullet from a gun,' says the second. The 
master answers : 

" ' A right good pace, but not enough for Faust.' To the third : SHow fast art thou ? * 

" ' As quick as Thought.' 

" ' That will suffice — there's naught so swift as Thought. Bear me to Mantua, to 
her I love, the princess of my heart ! ' 

" The Furio' takes Faust on her back, and they fly through the air. The servant 
makes, as before, critical and sarcastic remarks on what has passed, and the curtain 
falls. 

" In the third act the devil persuades Faust to murder his father, so as to inherit 
his treasures, ' for the old man has a tough life.' In the fourth, maddened by jealousy, 
he stabs the princess and her supposed lover. The small sarcastic servant takes the 
murdered pair .by the legs, and drags them about, cracking jokes, and giving the corpses 
cuffs on their ears to bring them again to life. 

" In the fifth act, the clock strikes eleven. Faust has now filled to the brim the 
measure of his iniquity. The devil appears, proves to him that it is time to depart ; it 
strikes twelve ; the smoke of a fizzling squib and several diabolical fire-crackers fills the air, 
and Faust is carried away, while the small servant, as satanical and self-possessed as ever, 
makes his jokes on the folly of Faust — and the curtain falls." 

This is the true Faust drama of the Middle Ages, with the ante- 
Shakespearian blending of tragedy and ribald fun. But this same 
mixture is found to perfection in the early Indian drama — for instance, in 
"Sakuntala" — and it would be indeed a very curious thing should it be 
discovered that the gypsies, who were in all ages small actors and showmen 
of small plays, had brought from the East some rude drama of a sorcerer, 
who is in the end cheated by his fiend. Such is, in a measure, the plot 
of the Baital Pachisi or Vikram and the Vampire, which is borrowed 
from or founded on old traditions, and the gypsies, from their familiarity 
with magic, and as practical actors, would, in all probability, have a 
Faust play of some kind, according to the laws of cause and effect. In 
any case the suggestion may be of value to some investigator. 

Gypsies in England — that is those " of the old sort " — regard a shoe- 
string as a kind of amulet or protection. Many think it is unlucky to 



GYPSY AMULETS. 249 

have one's photogragh taken, but no harm can come of it if the one who 
receives the picture gives the subject a shoe-string or a pair of laces. 

Dr. F. S. Krauss in his curious work, " Sreca, or Fortune and Fate in 
the popular belief of the South Slavonians" (Vienna, 18 86), draws a line 
of distinction between the fetish and amulet. " The fetish," he declares, 
" has virtue from being the dwelling of a protecting spirit. The amulet, 
however, is only a symbol of a higher power," that is of a power whose 
attention is drawn by or through it to the believer or wearer. This, 
however, like the distinction between idolatry and worshipping images as 
symbols of higher beings, becomes in the minds of the multitude (and 
for that matter, in all minds), a distinction without a dot of difference. 
The amulet may " rest upon a higher range of ideas, while the fetish stands 
on its own feet," but if both are regarded as bringing luck, and if, for 
instance, one rosary or image of the same person is believed to bring 
more luck than another, it is a fetish and nothing else. An amulet 
may pretend to be a genteeler kind of fetish, but they are all of the 
same family. 

The gypsies prepare among the Bosniacs, " on the high plains of 
Malwan," a fetish in the form of a cradle made of nine kinds of wood, 
to bring luck to the child who sleeps in it. But Dr. Krauss falls, I 
presume, into a very great error, when he attributes to her Majesty the 
Queen of England a belief in fetish, on the strength of the following 
remarkable passage from the Wiener Allgemeine Zeitung : — 

" By command of Oueen Victoria, Mr. Martin, Director of the Institute for the 
Blind, has attended to the making a cradle for the newly-born child of the Princess 
of Battenberg. The cradle is to be made entirely by blind men and women. The Oueen 
firmly believes that objects made by blind people bring luck." 

Truly, if anything could bring luck it ought to be something ordered 
with a kind and charitable view from poor and suffering people, but it is 
rather hard to promptly conclude that her Majesty believes in fetish because 
she benevolently ordered a cradle from the blind, and that she had no 

34 



250 GYPSY SORCERY. 

higher motive than to get something which would bring Juck to her 
grandchild. 

It may be observed in connection with this superstition that among 
the Hungarian gypsies several spells depend on using different kinds of 
wood, and that four are said to have been taken for the true cross. 

Gypsies, in common with the rest of the " fetishioners " of all the 
world, believe in the virtue of a child's caul. Dr. Krauss found in Kobas 
on the Save an amulet which contained such a caul with garlic and four- 
leaved clover. This .must have been a very strong charm indeed, particularly 
if the garlic was fresh. 

Another very great magic protector in every country among gypsies 
as well as Gentiles, is the thunderbolt, known in Germany as the Donneraxt, 
Donnerstein, Donnerkeil, Albschoss, Strahlstein, and Teufelsfinger . It was 
called by the Greeks Astrofeldkia, by the Latins Gemma ceraunia, by the 
Spaniards Piedras de rayo, by the dwellers in the French High Alps Peyras 
del tron (pierres de tonerre), by the Birmans Mogio (the child of light- 
ning), by the Chinese Rai-fu-seki (the battle-axe of Tengu, the guardian 
of Heaven), by the Hindoos Swayamphu, or " the self-originated." Dr. 
Krauss, from whom I have taken these remarks> adds that in America 
and Australia it is also regarded as a charm protective and luck-bringing. 
But here there is a confusion of objects. The thunderbolt described 
by Dr. Krauss is, I believe, a petrified shell, a kind of mucro or 
belemnite. The thunderbolt of the Red Indians really resembles it, but 
is entirely different in its nature. The latter results from lightning 
entering the sand fusing it. It sometimes makes in this way a very 
long tube or rod, with a point. People, finding these, naturally believed 
that they were thunderbolts. I knew an old Penobscot Indian who,, 
seeing the lightning strike the earth, searched and found such a thunder- 
bolt, which he greatly prized. In process of time people who found 
mucrones in rocks believed them to be the same as the glass-like points 
of fused sand which they so much resembled. 

The so-called thunderbolt is confused with the prehistoric stone axe,, 



GYPSY AMULETS. 251 

both bearing the same name in many lands. As this axe is often also a 
hammer it is evident that it may have been sacred to Thor. " The South 
Slavonian " — or gypsy — " does not distinguish," says Dr. Krauss, " between 
the thunderbolt and prehistoric axe. He calls both strelica. The possession 
of one brings luck and prosperity in all business, but it must be. constantly 
carried on the person. Among the " thirties " there lived in Gaj in Slavonia 
a poor Jewish peddler named David. Once he found a strelica. He always 
carried it about with him. The peasants envied him greatly its possession. 
They came to him in the market-place and cried, " Al si sretan, Davide ! " 
(" Ha, how lucky thou art, David ! ") The Slavonian Jews called him, 
for a joke, " Strelica." 

The prehistoric axe was probably regarded as gifted with fetish power, 
even in the earliest age, especially when it was made of certain rare materials. 
Thus among the Red Indians of Massachusetts stone " tomahawks " of 
veined, petrified wood were specially consecrated to burial-places, while 
in Europe axe-heads of jade were the most coveted of possessions. A. B. 
Meyer has written a large work, "Jade und Nephrit Objecte aus dem 
Ethnographische Museum zu Dresden, America und Europe " (Leipzig, 
1882). It has always been supposed that the objects of true jade came 
only from Tartary, and I believe that I was the first person to discover 
that it existed in quantities in Western Europe. The history of this 
" finding " is not without interest. 

It has been usual — it is said for a thousand years — for pilgrims to Iona 
to bring away with them as souvenirs a few green pebbles of a peculiar 
kind, and to this day, as every tourist will remember, the children who 
come to the steamboat offer handsful of them for sale. When I was there 
many years ago — in Iona — I also went away with perhaps twenty of them. 
One evening, after returning to London, there were at my home three 
Chinese gentlemen attached to the Legation. The conversation turned on 
Buddhist pilgrimages and Fusang, and the question, founded on passages 
in the Chinese annals, as to whether certain monks had really passed from 
the Celestial Kingdom to Mexico in the fifth century and returned. This 



252 GYPSY SORCERY 

reminded me of Iona, and I produced my green pebbles, and told what 
I knew about them. 

My visitors regarded the stones with great interest and held an animated 
conversation over them in Chinese, which I did not understand. Observing 
this I made them presents of the pebbles, and was thanked with an earnest- 
ness which seemed to me to be out of all proportion to the value of the 
gifts. Thinking this over the next day, I wrote to the clergyman at Iona 
asking him to be so kind as to send me some of the pebbles, and offering 
to pay for them. He did so, sending me by mail a box of the stones. 
Two or three were very pretty, one especially. It is of a dark green 
colour and slightly transparent. 

Two years after, when in Philadelphia, meeting with an old friend, 
Dr. Joseph Leidy, well known as a man of science, and, inter alia, as a 
mineralogist. I showed him my pebble and asked him what it was. 
He replied, " It is jade." To my query whether it might not be nephrite 
he answered no, that it was true jade of fine quality. 

Jade is in China a talismanic stone, many occult virtues and luck- 
bringing qualities being ascribed to it. It is very curious, and possibly 
something more than a mere chance coincidence, that the green pebbles 
of Iona were also carried as charms. It would be remarkable if even in 
prehistoric times, or in the stone age, Iona and Tartary had been connected 
by superstition and tradition. 

Among the gypsies as well as Christians in Servia, nuts, especially 
those which are heart-shaped [i.e., double), are carried as fetishes or amulets. 
In very early times a nut, as containing like a seed the principle of germi- 
nation and relf-reproduction, was typical of life. Being enclosed in a 
shell it seemed to be in a casket or box which was of itself a mystical 
symbol. Hence nuts are often found in ancient graves. There are many 
stories accordingly in all countries in which a nut or egg is represented 
as being connected with the life of some particular being or person. The 
ogre in several tales can live until a certain egg is broken. In the 
Graubunden or Grisons there is the following legend : — 



GYPSY AMULETS. 253 

" Once there lived near Fideriseau a rich peasant. To him came a poor beggar, who 
asked for alms in vain. Then the man replied, 'If thou wilt give me nothing yet will I give 
thee something. Thou shalt keep thy treasure and also thy daughter after thee ; yea, and 
for years after she is dead her spirit shall know no rest for taking care of it. But I give thee 
this nut. Plant it by yonder great stone, thou stony-hearted fool. From the nut will grow a 
tree, and from the tree twigs from which a cradle will be made in which a child will be 
rocked who will redeem thy daughter from her penance.' And after the girl died, a spirit of 
a pale woman with dark hair was seen flying nightly near Fideris, and that for many years, 
for it takes a long time for an acorn to grow up into an oak. But as she is no longer seen it 
is believed that the cradle has been made and the child born who became the deliverer." 

A. B. Elysseeff, in his very interesting article based on Kounavine's 
" Materials for the Study of the Gypsies," gives the representation of four 
gypsy amulets, also " a cabalistic token " that brings good luck to its 
wearer. 

" The amulets," writes M. Elysseeff", " are made of wrought iron and belong to M. 
Kounavine. The cabalistic sign is designed " (copied?) "by ourselves, thanks to the amiability 
of a gypsy djecmas (sorcerer) of the province of Novogorod. The amulet A was found by 
M. Kounavine among the gypsies who roam with their camps in the Ural neighbourhood ; 
some Bessarabian gypsies supplied B ; C was obtained from a gypsy sorcerer of the Persian 
frontier, and D formed a part of some ornaments placed with their dead by gypsies of 
Southern Russia. 

"The cabalistic sign" {vide illustration at head of chapter) "represents roughly a 
serpent, the symbol of Auromori, the evil principle in gypsy mythology. The figure of an 
arch surrounded with stars is, according to M. Kounavine, held by the gypsies as symbolizing 
the earth, the meaning of the triangle A is not known. The moon and stars which surround 
the earth and which are, so to speak, enclosed in the serpent's coils, symbolize the world 
lying in evil. This sign is engraved by gypsies upon the plates of the harness of the horses, 
of garments, and as designed ornaments." 

It may be here remarked that the symbolism of M. Kounavine, while 
it may be quite accurate, must be taken with great reserve. If the "arch" 
be simply a horse-shoe, all these ornaments, except the serpent, may be 
commonly found on the trappings of London dray-horses. 

"Amulet A, which also represents the sun, the moon, the stars, earth, and a serpent, can 
equally serve as a symbol of the universe. According to M. Kounavine, Ononi" (the Ammon 
of the Egyptians) "and Auromori, arc symbolized upon this amulet. Amulet B represents a 
man surrounded by a halo, aided by the moon and the stars, and armed with a sword and 



254 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



arrows. Beneath is represented the horse ; the serpent symbolizes Auromori. As a whole 
this amulet represents the conflict between the good and evil principle, Jandra (Indra) against 
Auromori. 

" Amulet C represents a gleaming star and the serpent, and is called Baramy (Brama), 
symbolizing, according to M. Kounavine, the gypsy proto-divinity. 

" Or amulet D, which represents a flaming pyre and some hieroglyphics, ?nay also 
symbolize the prayer addressed to the divinity of the fire." 

If these explanations were given by gypsy sorcerers the amulets are 
indeed very curious. But, abstractly, the serpent, arrows, stars, the moon, 
an archer, a fox, and a plant, occur, all the world over, on coins or in popular 
art, with or without symbolism, and I confess that I should have expected 
something very different as illustrating such a remarkable mythology as 
that given by M. Kounavine. However, the art of a nation- — as, for 
instance, that of the Algonkin Indians — may be very far indeed behind 
its myths and mental conceptions. 





CHAPTER XVI. 



GYPSIES, TOADS, AND TOAD-LORE. 

T went to the toad that lies under the wall, 
I charmed him out, and he came at my call." 

(" Masque of Oueens," Ben Jonson.) 

HE toad plays a prominent part 
I * n g)T s y ( as m other) witch- 
craft, which it may well do, since 
in most Romany dialects there 
is the same word for a toad or 
frog, and the devil. Paspati declares that 
the toad suggested Satan, but I incline to 
think that there is some as yet undiscovered 
Aryan word, such as beng, for the devil, 
and that the German Bengel, a rascal, is a 
descendant from it. However, gypsies and 
toads are " near allied and that not wide " 
from one another, and sometimes their chil- 
dren have them for pets, which recals the 
statements made in the celebrated witch 
trials in Sweden, where it was said by those 
who professed to have been at the Blockula, or Sabbat, that the little witch 




256 GYPSY SORCERY. 

children were set to play at being shepherds, their flocks being of 
toads. 

I have been informed by gypsies that toads do really form unaccountable 
predilections for persons and places. The following is accurately related as 
it was told me in Romany fourteen years ago, in Epping Forest, by a girl. 
" You know, sir, that people who live out of doors all the time, as we do, 
see and know a great deal about such creatures. One day we went to a 
farmhouse, and found the wife almost dying because she thought she was 
bewitched by a woman who came every day in the form of a great toad to 
her door and looked in. And, sure enough, while she was talking the toad 
came, and the woman was taken in such a way with fright that I thought 
she'd have died. But I had a laugh to myself; for I knew that toads have 
such ways, and can not only be tamed, but will almost tame themselves. 
So we gypsies talked together in Romany, and then said we could remove 
the spell if she would get us a pair of shears and a cup of salt. Then we 
caught the toad, and tied the shears so as to make a cross — you see ! — and 
with it threw the toad into the fire, and poured the salt on it. So the 
witchcraft was ended, and the lady gave us a good meal and ten shillings." 
(For a Romany poem on this incident vide " English Gypsy Songs," Triibner 
and Co., 1875). And there is a terrible tale told by R. H. Stoddard, 
in a poem, that one day a gentleman accidentally trod on a toad and 
killed it. Hearing a scream at that instant in the woods at a little 
distance, followed by an outcry, he went to see what was the matter, and 
found a gypsy camp where they were lamenting the sudden death of a 
child. On looking at the corpse he was horrified to observe that it 
presented every appearance of having been trampled to death, its wounds 
being the same as those he had inflicted on the toad. This story being 
told by me to the gypsy girl, she in no wise doubted its truth, being in 
fact greatly horrified at it ; but was amazed at the child chovihani, or 
witch, being in two places at once. 

In the Spanish Association of Witches in the year 16 10 (vide Lorent, 
" Histoire de l'lnquisition ") the toad played a great part. One who had 



GYPSIES, TOADS, AND TOAD-LORE. 257 

taken his degrees in this Order testified that, on admission, a mark like a 
toad was stamped on his eyelid, and that a real toad was given to him 
which had the power to make its master invisible, to transport him to 
distant places, and change him to the form of many kinds of animals^ 1 
There is a German interjection or curse cc Kroten-dilvel ! " or " toad-devil," 
which is supposed to have originated as follows : When the Emperor 
Charlemagne came into the country of the East Saxons and asked them 
whom they worshipped they replied, " Krodo is our god ;" to which the 
Emperor replied " Krodo is all the same as Kroten-diivel ! " " And he 
made them pay bitterly by the sword and the rope for the crime of calling 
God, according to their language, by a name different from that which he 
used ; for he put many thousands of them to death, like King Olof of 
Norway, to show that his faith was one of meekness and mercy." 

It is bad to have one's looks against one. The personal appearance 
of the toad is such as to have given it a bad place in the mythology of 
all races. The Algonkin Indians — who, like Napoleon and Slawkenbergius, 
were great admirers of men with fine bold noses — after having studied 
the plane physiognomy of the toad, decided that it indicated all the vices, 
and made of the creature the mother of all the witches. Nothing could 
have been more condemnatory ; since in their religion — as in that of the 
Accadians, Laps, and Eskimo — a dark and horrible sorcery, in which 
witches conciliated evil spirits, was believed to have preceded their own 
nobler Shamanism, by which these enemies of mankind were forced or 
conquered by magic. Once the Great Toad had, as she thought, succeeded 
in organizing a conspiracy by which Glooskap, the Shamanic god of Nature, 
was to be destroyed. Then he passed his hand over her face and that of 
her fellow-conspirator the Porcupine ; and from that time forth their noses 
were flat, to the great scorn of all honest well-beaked Indians. 

The old Persians made the toad the symbol and pet of Ahriman, the 
foe of light, and declared that his Charfester, or attendant demons, took 
that form when they persecuted Ormuzd. Among the Tyrolese it is a 
type of envy ; whence the proverb, " Envious as a toad." In the Middle 

35 



2 5 8 GYPSY SORCERY. 

Ages, among artists and in many Church legends, it appears as Greed or 
Avarice : there is even to this day, in some mysterious place on the right 
bank of the Rhine between Laufenberg and Binzgau, a pile of coals on 
which sits a toad. That is to say, coals they seem to the world. But 
the pile is all pure gold, and the toad is a devil who guards it; and he 
who knows how can pronounce a spell which shall ban the grim guardian. 
And there is a story told by Menzel (" Christliche Symbolik," vol. i. p. 530), 
that long ago there lived in Cologne a wicked miser, who when old repented 
and wished to leave his money to the poor. But when he opened his great 
iron chest, he found that every coin in it had turned to a horrible toad 
with sharp teeth. This story being told to his confessor, the priest saw 
in it divine retribution, and told him that God would have none of his 
money — nay, that it would go hard with him to save his soul. And he, 
being willing to do anything to be free of sin, was locked up in the chest 
with the toads ; and lo ! the next day when it was opened the creatures 
had eaten him up. Only his clean-picked bones remained. 

But in the Tyrol it is believed that the toads are themselves poor 
sinners, undergoing penance as Hoetschen or Hoppinen — as they are locally 
called — for deeds done in human form. Therefore, they are regarded with 
pity and sympathy by all good Christians. And it is well known that 
in the Church of Saint Michael in Schwatz, on the evening before the 
great festivals, but when no one is present, an immense toad comes crawling 
before the altar, where it kneels and prays, weeping bitterly. The general 
belief is that toads are for the most part people who made vows to go on 
pilgrimages, and died with the vows unfulfilled. So the poor creatures go 
hopping about astray, bewildered and perplexed, striving to find their way 
to shrines which have perchance long since ceased to exist. Once there 
was a toad who took seven years to go from Leifers to Weissenstein ; 
and when the creature reached the church it suddenly changed to a 
resplendent white dove, which, flying up to heaven, vanished before the 
eyes of a large company there assembled, who bore witness to the miracle. 
And one day as a wagoner was going from Innsbruck to Seefeld, as he 



GYPSIES, TOADS, AND TOAD-LORE. 259 

paused by the wayside a toad came hopping up and seemed to be desirous 
of getting into the wagon ; which he, being a benevolent man, helped it 
to do, and gave it a place on the seat beside him. There it sat like any 
other respectable passenger, until they came to the side-path which leads to 
the church of Seefield ; when, wonderful to relate ! the toad suddenly turned 
to a maiden of angelic beauty clad in white, who, thanking the wagoner 
for his kindness to her when she was but a poor reptile, told him that she 
had once been a young lady who had vowed a pilgrimage to the church of 
Seefield. 

In common with the frog, the toad is an emblem of productiveness, 
and ranks among creatures which are types of erotic passion. I have in my 
possession a necklace of rudely made silver toads, of Arab workmanship, 
intended to be worn by women who wish to become mothers. Therefore 
the creature, in the Old World as well as in the New, appears as a being 
earnestly seeking the companionship of men. Thus it happened to a youth 
of Aramsach, near Kattenberg, that, being one day in a lonely place by a 
lake, there looked up at him from the water a being somewhat like a maid 
but more like a hideous toad, with whom he entered into conversation ; 
which became at last friendly and agreeable, for the strange creature talked 
exceeding well. Then she, thinking he might be hungry, asked him if he 
would fain have anything in particular to eat. He mentioned in jest a kind 
of cakes ; whereupon, diving into the lake, she brought some up, which 
he ate. So he met her many times ; and whenever he wished for anything, 
no matter what, she got it for him from the waters : the end of it all being 
that, despite her appalling ugliness, the youth fell in love with her and 
offered marriage, to which she joyfully consented. But no sooner had the 
ceremony been performed than she changed to a lady of wonderful beauty ; 
and, taking him by the hand, she conducted him to the lake, into which 
she led him, and "in this life they were seen never more." This legend 
evidently belongs to frog-lore. According to one version, the toad after 
marriage goes to a lake, washes away her ugliness, and returns as a beauty 
with the bridegroom to his castle, where they live in perfect happiness. 



26o 



GYPSY SORCERY. 



I have also a very old silver ring, in which there is set a toad rudely 
yet artistically carved in haematite, or blood-stone. These were famous 
amulets until within two or three hundred years. 

If you are a gypsy and have a tame toad it is a great assistance in 
telling fortunes, and brings luck — that commodity which, asXALLOT observed, 
the gypsies are always selling to everybody while they protest they them- 
selves have none. As I tested with the last old gypsy woman whom I met : 
" What bak the divvus ? " — " What luck to-day ? " " Kekker rya " — " None, 
sir," was the reply, as usual, " I never have any luck." So like a mirror they 
reflect all things save themselves, and show you what they know not. 

"I've seen you where you never were 

And where you never will be ; 
And yet within that very place 

You can be seen by me. 
For to tell what they do not know 

Is the art of the Romany." 




INDEX. 



Abominable charms, 120 

Acorns, Song of the, 221 

Adelheit von Helbach, 229 

^Eolian harp, 166 

Agnes, St., Invocation, 76 

Agnostics, 213 

Albordi, 57 

Algonkin Legends of New England, 69 

Alraun, root image, 153 

Alsatian gypsy girl and shell, 233, 234 

Al Sirat, 57 

Alter-ego, or the Dream-power, 165, &c. 

Amber beads, 198 

American Follc-Lore Journal, 218, 227 

Amulets and fetishes, 234 

Amulets, 228, &c. 

Animals, Charms to protect, 79-99 

Anna, Santa, the Lucina of the Romans, 101 

Antony, Saint, 64, 135 

Apple (love-charm), 140, 141 

Archaeology — Ethnology, ix 

Arnold, Matthew xi, 215 

Aroint, Etymology of, 199 

Artificial propagation, 101 

Ashes of dress (love-charm), 120 

Assisi, St. Francis, shells, 234 

Astral spirit, 166 

At-was-kenni-ges, an Algonkin giant-spirit, 

J 7 
Augustus, Emperor, punished a city-father for 

eating a quail, 90 
Axe-heads, Stone, in trees, 18 

B. 
Badger, Foot of a (love-charm), 120 



Baricellus, J. C, 46 

Bath, Incident near, 180 

Bath Kol, the Voice, &c, 220, 238 

Batford, J. C, divination by hair, 1 24 

Bat in gypsy sorcery, 92 

Bears' claws and teeth as amulets, 26 

Beauty, a real existence, 187 

Begotten by goblins, People, 206 

Benediction, 42 

Benemmerinnen, Hebrew witches, 63 

Bergmanner, or Mountain Dwarfs, 131, 132 

Bernoni, Works of, 156 

Berserkers (note), 145 

Bertha, the Dream-sprite, 167 

Berufen, overlooked or bewitched, 51, 56 

Betham, Sir William, Eugubcean Tablets, 

211 
Bhut, Hindoo malignant spirit, 9, 10, 11 
Bill, the imaginary companion, 3 
Billy Dawson, the Wise Man of Stokesley, 197 
Bird's nest, Hair in, 121 
Black dog, 60, 61, 62 
Black Hen, Fast of the, 137 
Blavatsky, Mme., 171 
Blessing of the Syrups, Oil, cS^c, 150 
Block, Dr., corpse-candle superstition, xii 
Blocksberg, 30 

Blood, Charm with, 119, 120 
Boars' tusks worn as amulets, 26, 27, 102, 

103 ; engraving, 103 
Bodinus, 240 
Bogey, Bog, Buh, Boggar, Bogle, Bo-guest, 

Boll, Boman, &c, 161 
Bogomiles, 36, 63 
Bolton, Carrington H., Counting -out 

Rhymes, 218-220, 225 



262 



INDEX. 



Book of Fate and works on Fortune-telling, 
xvi 

Booth, General, his devil-drivers, 5 

Borrow, G., Hokkani ba.ro, 211 

Bratraneck, Beitrage zur jEsthetik der Pflan- 
zenwelt, 53 

Bridge, 57 

Broom to keep spirits or witches away, 136 

Brown, Mrs., 214. 

Brown study, reverie : when the mind is 
abstracted from certain subjects dream- 
power partially acts, 169 

Buckland, Lizzie, a gypsy woman, 144 

Budge cured by a song : gypsies mere 
Budges, 22 

Buzz, To cry, 200 

Byron, staff-rhymes, 43, 166 



Cabalists, 238 

Cake, Gypsy, 143, 144 

Callot and gypsies, 258 

Calvin, 239 

Candle, in love-charm, 1 20 

Candles, Blessed, 42 

Cane inspired by a spirit, 229 

Carlyle, Thomas, 185 

Carmen mirum ad Glandulas, 221 

Carpenter (" Physiology "), 163 

Casket, Gypsy, to send away disease, 15, 16 

Cassel, P., "Die Symbolik des Blutes," 87 

Castellani, 229 

Castor Oil, Benediction of, 150 

Cat, Swinging a, 136 

Cato, incantations, 54 

Cedrenus, 238 

Centaurs, 126 

Chagrin, a gypsy demon, 91, 92, 93 

Chaldean magic, Shamanic, 62, 63 

Chapter I. : Origin of Witchcraft, Shamanism, 
and Sorcery — Vindictive and Mischievous 
Magic, 1-12 

Chapter II. : Charms and Conjurations to 
cure disorders of grown people — Hun- 
garian Gypsy Magic, 12-41 



Chapter III. : Gypsy Conjurations and 
Exorcisms — The cure of children — Hun- 
garian gypsy spells — Curious old Italian 
secret — Magic virtues of garlic — A Floren- 
tine incantation learned from a witch — • 
Liiith, the child-stealer and Queen of the 
Witches, 41-65 

Chapter IF. : South Slavonian and other 
Gypsy Witch-lore — The words for a witch 
— Vilas and the spirits of earth and air — 
Witches — Egg-shells and egg-lore — Egg 
Proverbs — Ova de Crucibus, 65-79 

Chapter V. : Charms to protect Animals, 79- 
100 

Chapter VI. : Of Pregnancy, and Charms 
and Folk-lore connected with it — Boars' 
teeth and styptic charms, 101-107 

Chapter VII. : Recovery of stolen property — 
Love-charms — Shoes and love-potions, or 
philtres, 108-121 

Chapter VIII. : Roumanian and Transyl- 
vanian Sorceries and Superstitions, con- 
nected or identical with those of the 
Gypsies, 122-141 

Chapter IX. : Rendezvous of Witches, Sor- 
cerers, and Vilas — Continuation of South 
Slavonian Gypsy-lore, 142-151 

Chapter X. : Haunts and Homes of Witches 
in South Slavic lands — Bogeys and Hum- 
bugs, 152-161 

Chapter XL : Gypsy Witchcraft, the magical 
power innate in all men and women — How 
it may be developed — The principles of 
Fortune-telling, 162—185 

Chapter XII. : Fortune-telling continued — 
Romance based on chance or hope as 
regards the future — Folk- and Sorcery-lore 
— Authentic gypsy predictions, 186-193 

Chapter XIII. : Proverbs referring to 
Witches, Gypsies, and Fairies, 194-208 

Chapter XIV. : A Gypsy Magic Spell— Lellin 
Dudikabin, or the Great Secret — Children's 
Rhymes and Incantations — -Ten Little 
Indian Boys and Acorn Girls of Marcellus 
Burdigalensis, 209-229 



INDEX. 



*3 



Chapter XV. : Gypsy Amulets, 230-254 

Chapter XVI. : Gypsies, Toads, and Toad- 
lore, 255-260 

Charles the Simple (straw), 32 

Charley Boy, a child's song, 22 

Charms and Conjurations to cure disorders of 
grown people, 12 

Chen, the Sun, 5c 

Chesme, the Turkish fountain-cat nymph, 

I3 2 , 133 
Childbirth Sorceries, 47, 48, 49 
Children, Why gypsies steal, 147 
Child, To know if a woman is with, 101 ; 

to recover stolen property, no 
Child's blood used in magic, 86, 87 
Child-stealing, 62 
Chinese bottles, 229 
Chiromancy among gypsies, 176 
Chov-hani, gypsy for witch, 67 
Christian scientist, metaphysical doctor, &c, 

2 3 
Church influence, 157 
Cin-vat, 57 

Coals in magic, 51, 52, 54, 60 
Coena demonum, or demons' supper, 136 
Collecting in Folk-lore, x, xii 
Conceptions, Supernatural, developed with 

the mind, 4, 5 
Conception, To promote, 100, 101 
" Conditions for the Survival of Archaic 

Customs," by G. L. Gomme, Arch. Rev., 

1890 
" Congres des Traditiones populaires : ' of 

1889, x 
Conscious will, 168 
Constantinc, Bath of Blood, 238 
Convulsive weeping, 60 
Cordus (Elder), 30 
Cornelius Agrippa, 53 ; and la haute Magie, 

xvi 
Corpse-candle superstition, xiii 
Counting-out Rhymes and Spells, Chapter 

XIV. 
•Cowries, used as amulets, 102 
•Crab, Ashes of, in bewitching, 120 



Cramp (night), Spell against, 36 

Cromagnon, The Man of, 6 

Cross on a grave, 106 

Cross-road, Spell of the, 118, 119, 15: 

Cross-roads, gypsy meeting-place, 152 

Crow, Eye of a (love-charm), 120 

Cuckoo, Song of, an omen, 18 

Cups and goblets, Divination by, 227 



Dancing naked, 158 

Dancing, Witch and gypsy, 158, 159 

Danku Niculai, 45 

Darwin, x 

David, the Slavonian Jew, 249 

Dead Man's Hand, xiii 

De Injuriis, &c. (straw), 32 

Delancre, Pierre, on witch-dancing, 158 

Delrio, 149, 240 

"Denham Tract," 197 

Desbarolles, 176, 181 

Design and Minor Arts, 171 

Devil believed to be the direct cause of all 

pain, evil, and sin, 13 
Devil's bridges, 57 

Devil doctrines among Red Indians, 13 
Devilism to Polytheism, thence Pantheism, 

thence Monotheism, 157 
Devla or Del, the gypsy highest god, 69 
Dialen, Roumanian fairies, 67 
Diana, a cat-goddess, 132, 133 
Diana and Herodias, 37, 64 
Diana, Dina, Gana, Sina, Queen of the 

Witches, 132, 133 
Dietrich the Thuringian, 159 
Diseases : all diseases anciently believed to be 

caused by devils, 13, 149, 150 
Dogs, Descent from, 715 a love-charm, 112 
Dolls, Ancient, 167 
Donkeys, Blessing of, 42 
DragomanorT, Prof., 32, 39 
Drawing and designing, 166 
Dream-book, xvi 
Dream, Narrative of a, 164 
Dream, the dream-power, faculty, or function 



264 



INDEX. 



by which memories are loosened and re- 
combined, while will issuspended, 162-185 

Dreams caused by a second Me or an action 
of the brain independent of common 
sense, 14 

Dream-power — its action penetrates more or 
less into all working life, 169 

Drum, Picture of Lapland magic, 79 ; or 
tambourine, Gypsy, 80 ; Turkish, 80 ; used 
in divination by all Shamanic sorcerers, 79 

Dschuma, the cholera-witch, 133 

Dualism, result of Monotheism, 157 

Du Cange, 224 

Dudikabin, to lei, 211 

Duncan, Geilles, a witch, 198 



Easter-eggs, Red, 78 

Easter Monday, sprinkling with water, 139 

Ecco l'imbasciatore, song, 225 

Edda, 71 

Edison, x 

Education, Practical, 3 

Eggs and eggshells, Superstitions and stories 

referring to, 72, 73, 74, 75 
Eggs in childbirth, 49 
Egg-lore, a cosmogenic symbol, jj 
Egg proverbs, y~, 78 
" Egyptian Sketch Book," 146 
Elder-bark, 28, 29, 30 
Ellekoner, Elfwoman, Danish, 6j 
Ellhorn (Elder), Frau, 29 
Else, die rauhe, 69 
Elysseeff, Dr. A., 107-40, 208, 251 
Emerson, R. W., 57 
" English Gypsies and their Language, The," 

by C. G. Leland, 203 
Entering new houses, 137 
Eos, goddess of Aurora, 28 
Era, a New, in Thought, 8 
Erysipelas, Cure for, 28 
Esculapius, and serpent, 38 
Estmere, Sir, Percy Ballads, 159 
Euguane, Roumanian fairies, 67 
Evil-eye, charm against it, 51, 52, 54, 57 



Exorcism, 42, 43 

Eyes, Pain in, Incantation for, 27 



Fairies, Queen of the, 63 ; varieties of, 67 ; 
proverbs, 202 

Fairy-rings, 68 

Faith-cure, 23 

Fanggen, Fanken, Norkel, the fairies of the 
Tyrol, 67 

Fascinator, Eye of, 2 

Faust, Gypsy puppet-show of, 245, 246 

Faw Gang, The, 201 

Fetishism and Shamanism, 157 

Fever demon, 20, 63 

Fevers, cured, 12, 16, 17 ; cured by dig- 
ging hole, &c, 18, 19 ; with a kreuzer,. 
Sec, 19 ; cured by water, &c, 19, 20 

Fichte, J. G., 174 

Fire, Charm against, 40 

Fish and brandy, a charm, 119 

Florentine fortune-teller, 225 

Folding mirror, The, 166 

Folk-lore perfects the study of History, 188 
Red Indian Folk-lore suffered to perish, 188 

Folk-lore, Transmission of, 123 

Foot-print, Earth from a, used in a love- 
charm, 112 

Fortune-teller in Florence on sorcery, xiv. 

Fortune-telling by canary birds, Sec, 183 

Fortune-telling, Spirit of Gypsy, 174 

Friedrich, J. B., " Symbolik der Natur," 29, 52, 
76, 96, 117, 128, 132, 138, 235 

Frog bones used as an amulet, 26 

Frog incantation, 13 ; love-potion, 119 

Frogs, used to cure fever, 12 



Gabalis, Comte de, 46 

Galton, Francis, x, 184 

Gana (Diana), queen of the witches, 132 

Gander-goose, Orchis maculata, used in love- 
potions, 1 19 

Ganet, Dom Leitas (Donna Branca ou a 
Conquista do Algarre), 72 



INDEX. 



265 



in magic, 52, 91, 92, 97, 



Garlic, used 
136 

Garzonius nel Serraglio, 46 

Gaster, Dr., 37, 39, 63 

George, St., his Day, Eve, 118, 142, 143, 147, 
148 

Gerard, Mrs. E., "Land beyond the Forest," 
126, 127, 130, 134, 135, 137, 138, 139, 
207 

Gertrude, German queen of the witches, 133 

Gessler and his hat, 242 

Gettatura, witch signs, 200 

Goat-lore, 83, 84 

Gookin, Mother, straw-man, 32 

Graff, 223 

Grass, a love-charm with, III; old custom, 
112 

Grease, Axle, &c, 148, 149 

Gregor (Oueen), Folk-lore of the North-east 
of Scotland, 76 

Grillandus, Paulus, 64, 149 ; on Torture, 240, 
242 

Grimm ("Deutsche Mythologie "), 29, 54, 
112 ; acorn song, 222, 223, 224 

Groome, Francis, 159 

Grosius, Magica, 238 

Gubernatis, Count Angelo de, on heathenism 
in Tuscany, xiv, 105, 126, 133, 135, 138, 
223 

Guin, Kam, Chen-Guin^ 50 

Gun, Enchanted, 131 

Gypsies and old age, 47 

" Gypsies, The," by C. G. Leland, 209 

Gypsies: their dissemination of Folk-lore, 
x, xi ; basis of Gypsy Sorcery, xi ; Gypsy 
Sorcery not exhausted in this work, but 
only used to illustrate the main subject, 
xii. Affinity with the Indian Dom — How 
gypsies became fortune-tellers, 2, 3 ; came 
from India, 8 

Gypsy Conjurations, Chapter III. 

Gypsy dancing : the debauched dancing of 
witches possibly of gypsy origin, 158 

Gypsy divination, the action of the Dream- 
power or Alter-ego, 173 



Gypsy fortune-teller in Cairo, 235, 236 
Gypsy incantation, A, &c, 209 
Gypsy-Lore 'Journal, 208 
Gypsy, Lucky to meet a, 129, 130 
Gypsy religion, 70 ; sorcery, 159, 160 
Gypsy Sorcery mingled with Slavonian, 65, 
66 

H. 

Hair, a means of fascination, 98 ; Charms for 
the, 23, 24, 25 ; superstitions, &c, 24, 25, 
26, 60, 92, 93, 120, 121 

Hale, Prof. Horatio, "On the Origin of 
Language," 3 ; instances of children, 4 

Haifa horse, half alligator, 127 

Halliwell, def. "humbug," 16 

Hand, Oath by the, 110 

Hare, Counting-out rhyme and incantation, 
22.4, 225 

Harginn, Chagrin, an Indian demon, 91 

Hawthorne, N. P., 31 

Hazel, Lady, 196 

Head, bumped, Charm for, 61 

Headache, Remedy for, with incantation, 21 

Heine, definition of ideas, 7, 43, 130 ; pro- 
phecy, 184; 228 ; witch poem, 244 

Hell-shoon, 113 

Hen, Black, Sorcery and superstitions con- 
nected with, 21 ; egg of black hen, 90, 91, 
127, 128 

Henry, Joseph, Prof., 177 

Hermann, Prof. Dr. A., xi, 45, 105 

Hermanstadt, Lake near, where the devil 
brews storms, 129 

Hermes Trismegistus, 171 

Hemorrhages, Menses, Profluvium or flow 
of blood : to cause or to prevent it, 101, 
103, 104 ; old German and Roman spells 
for flow of blood, 104 

Herodias, 36, 37, 64 

Hindoo Priest, The, a low type of Shaman, 
9, 10 

Hole in a tree, 62 

Hollc, Frau, a lady, 29 

Holy Virgin, cramp, 36 



36 



266 



INDEX. 



Horns of cattle, wreathed as spell, 143 
Horse, Charms to protect, 81, 82, 84., 97; 

to recover a stolen, 109 
Horst, "Dasmonomagia," 64, 244 
Humbug, Origin of the word, 161 
Husband, Spells to know the future, 117 
Hypnotism, x 

I. 

Incantations, Florentine, used in divining by- 
cards, 44 

" Index librum prohibitorum," 241 

Indian (American) trader named Ross, Anec- 
dote of, 179 

.indian, Red, views of marvels and super- 
natural power, 179 

Indians, or Hindoos, not all of the religions 
of Brahma or Buddha, 9 

Innocent, Pope, Bull of, 240 

Interlacing and serpentine patterns intended 
to bewilder and negative the evil eye, 98 

Invisible, How to become, 148 

Iona, the jade pebbles of, 249 

Irish, Earse, Aryan, 123 

Irving, Washington, 226 

" Isis Unveiled," 7 

Italian Witchcraft, 155, 156; story of Floren- 
tine witch, 1 56 

J- 
Jandra, 40 
Jeremia, Pope, 63 
Job, Book of, moon-worship forbidden in it, 

5°, 5 1 

John, St., witches meet on Eve of St. John or 
St. George, 143; kill cows, 144, 145 

Jonson, Ben, staff-rhymes, 43 

Joule, x 

Jug of water, lucky to meet a woman carry- 
ing, 130 

K. 
Kay, David, memory, 162, 171 
Keats, 166 
Kelley, "Indo-European Folk-lore," 114. 



Keightley's " Fairy Mythology," 202, 203 
Kerner, Justinus, 166 
Kerr, Bellenden, old Dutch, 214 
Key, To find a, 1 1 3 
I Klek, The tavern-keeper of; a witch wife, 

73 
Klingsohr, a Zingar wizard, 159 
" Knaben Wunderhorn Des," 196 
Knife, 230-231 ; in sorcery, 61 
Knots, Love, 1 39 
Knots of hair, 93 ; knots in willow-twigs, 

IIO, III 

Kornmann, H, "Curiosa," 146 

Kounavine, M., 40, 107, 208, 251 

Krauss, Dr. F. S., of Vienna, his works, xi, 

65, 65, 67, 69, 73, 142, 145, 148, 152, 

247-248 
Kugler, "Handbuch Geschichte der Malerei," 

235 
Kukaya, origin of the gypsy tribe so called, 
70, 71 



Lada, Slavonian Venus, 138 

Lady or spirit in the well, 137 

Laki, Lakshmi, 107 

La Motte Fouque, Undines, 146 

Language, Origin of, 3, 4; denied to the 

earliest types of man, 6 
Lantern, The Fairies', 203 
Latche romni, or female magicians in 

Hungary, 46 
Latour, Charlotte de la, "Symbols of Flowers " 

(straw), 31 
Layard, Sir H. Austen, 235 
Leek, Magic virtues of, 53 
"Legends of the Birds," by C. G. Leland, 

154 
Leidy, Dr. Joseph, 250 
"Leitner, Dr., Results of a Tour in Dardistan, 

Kashmir," &c, 91 
Leland, Charles Godfrey : the Algonkin 

Indians, &c, 55 
"Le Normant, Magie Chaldaienne," 44, 62 
Lettuce, Divination by, 54 



INDEX. 



267 



Levi, Eliphaz (l'Abbe Constant), 238 
L'ibussa, Queen of Bohemia : Slavic lore, 

"5 
Liebich, R. ("Die Zigeuner "), 110, 315 
Liebrecht, J., 91 
Lightment, theft (old cant), 211 
Lightning averted by sticking a knife into a 

loaf of bread, 128 
Lilith, or Herodias, 36, 37, 62, 63, 64 
Lime or linden tree, 138 
Ljesje, Russian fairies, 67 
Lob's Pound, 202 
Lockyer, Norman, x 
Lord and Lady Cramp, Disease, Vampire 

and Wehrwolf, 37 
Lord of the Forest, 1 3 1 
Lorent, "Hist, de l'lnquisition," 254 
Love-charm from English gypsy, 53 
Love incantations, m 



M. 

Mac Ritchie, " Earth Houses and their In- 
habitants"; "The Testimony of Tradi- 
tion," 70 

Magdalen, Mary, 138 

Magic brought by gypsies to Europe, xi ; as 
prevalent in some form now as ever, xv 

Magic power of Dreams, Chapter XI. ; the 
production of what is not measured by 
waking-will, 163 

Magnusen, Fin, on the Elder-tree, 28, 29 

Malocchio, 103 

Mama padura, or Weshni dye, the forest- 
mother, 130 

Manes, 64 

Man, Primitive, and his religion, 6. 

Marcellus Burdigalcnsis, charm for toothache, 
&c, 54, 61, 102, 104, 221, 224 

Maria Theresa Dollars, 231, 232 

Marvels : all marvels and miracles begin and 
end with man himself, 171 

Mascot, 147 

Mashmurdalo, The gypsy sylvan giant, 8 ; 
invocation to, 16 



Maudsley, on Attention and Interest, 172 

Meal, 52, 56, 58, 59 

Memory, latent power : how it may be de- 
veloped, 171 

Men first made from leaves, 94 ; or from 
trees, 94 

Menzel, Christh., " Symbolik," 256 

Merbitz, J. V., " De Infantibus Supposititiis," 
60 

Miklosich, 50 

Milk the tether, To, 199 

Milles, Dean,'MS. ("humbug"), 161 

Millni, "Gallerie Mythologique," 237 

Milton, John, attributes all disease-to sin and 
the devil, 150 

Mirandola, Picus de, 64 

Mole, 223, 224 

Moncrief Maradan, " The Historiogriffe of 
Cats," 137 

Monotheism, 157 

Moon, Full, 'charms, 5c 

Moon, in incantation, 85 

Moon-worship, 50, 51 

Morgan,; C. Lloyd, 130 

Mors, Mars, 125 

Mountain Monk, 132 



N. 



Naglfara, the ship made of dead men's nails, 

7 1 
Nails, 71, 147 

Nakedness in witch-spells, 133, 134, 135 
Name, Nav, 220 
Names suffice for explanations with many 

people, 177, 178 
Nano, a Hindoo Gypsy, 230, 231 
Nature, No violation of the laws of, 178 
Negro-Gypsies, 215 

Nettle, The, in gypsy and other Folk-lore, 
Newell, W. W., 227 
Night side of Nature, The true, 168 
Nivasi, or Nivashi, spirits of earth, 46, 48, 

56, 60, 69 
Norden "Reise nach Aegypten," 228 



268 



INDEX. 



Nose-bleeding charm, 39, 61 

Nyerup, Lexicon, on the Elder-tree, 29 

O. 

Oakley, Mr. : Indian snake-charmers, 131 

Oameni micuti, small men, 131 

Odin, 159 

Oliana, the Slavonic spirit of water, 35 

Olof Tryggvasen, 113 

Om ren, the wild man, 131 

Ora de Crucibus, or eggs with crosses on 
them, 78 

Oriental origin of Slavonian and Hungarian 
Folk-lore, 155 

Origin of witch-meetings, 142, 143 

Orken, Roumanian fairies, 6j 

Owen, Miss Mary, of St. Joseph, Missouri, 
99 

P. 

Palace in Italy long closed, 167 

Pale Boshe, 45 

Panusch, or Pan, 130 

Paphnutius, St., Incantations to, 33 

Paracelsus, Fairy mythology, 67 

Paraschiva, Venus, 125 

Patterns in Persian carpets made intricate 
to avert witchcraft and the evil eye, 98 

Paul, St., prayer against snakes, 38 

Pchuvasi, spirits of water, 46, 48, 49 ; ances- 
tors of a gypsy tribe, 70 

Pchuvus' wife, 59 ; Pchuvus, Incantation to, 
61 

Peacocks, 154 

Peel or Primrose witches, 155 

Peklo, Pikuljk, a Lithuanian god, 29 

Periani, Parjandra, Perun, 40 

Persian dancers, 158 

Peru urphu, 1 17 

Peter Pindar (Wolcott), 217 

Peter, St. (toothache), 38 

Phooka, 204 

Phynoderee, Manx fairy, 203 

Pig as an amulet, 102 

Pigwiggan, a fairy, 204 



Pipernus, P., " De EfFectibus Magicis," 46, 

64, 149 
Pixey, 202 

Plato, Memory according to, x, 220 
Pliny incantations, 54 
Plundering of peasants by gypsies, 214, 215, 

216 
Poetical and artistic composition always the 

result of awakening the Dream faculty, 

166 ; its action asleep or waking, 166 
Porcellana, porcella, porcelain, 102 
Portalis, " Couleurs Symboliques," 28 
Potions, Revolting, 127 
Povodne Vile, Slavonian water-spirits, 69 
Pozemne Vile. Slavonian earth-spirits, 69 
Praetorius, J., Witch-ride and Elder, 30 ; 

meal, 58, 59,63, 78 ; on gypsies, 176, 177 
" Practical Education," by C. G. Leland, 

171,184 
Prag, Prague, cemetery, 30 
Prediction and Prophecy, their origin, 189 
Prediction, Unconscious, by the author, Two 

instances of, 174 
Pregnancy, 101, 102 
Priccolitsh, Priculics, 62 
Priest, Unlucky to meet a, 129 
Princess, The, and boots, 116 
Prschemischl, Legend of shoes, 115, 1 16 
Property, To recover stolen, 109, no 
Prophecy developed by unconscious action of 

Memory and Dream-power, 169, 170 
Pscipolnitza, Flox goddess, 125 
Pudding, The Witch's, 56 
Puschkeit, a form of Pluto, 29 
Pythagoras, 220 



Quail, the devil's bird, 89 ; the Quail in 

Greek mythology, 89, 90 
Quails used to cure cattle, 87, 88 
Ouail-weed (Wachtelkraut), 9c 
Ouatrefages, M. de, 6 
Queen of England, Her Majesty the, 247, 

248 



INDEX, 



269 



Queen, The, extract from, relative to witches 

and eggs, 75, 76 
Quickness of perception, 172 
Quintus Serenus, garlic, 136 

R. 

Radical function of Dream-power, to prevent 
images from being forgotten, 169 

Rainbow, Pointing at, 128 

Ravens, The Seven, 51, 52 

Read, T. B., the poet, 165 

Religion : Sorcery called the "old religion" 
in Tuscany, xiv 

Ribbon, Red or yellow, 113 

Richmond, John Bell, 197 

Richter, Jean Paul, 185 

Ring, Charm with a, 118 

Robin and wren, 127 

Romance, Life requires, 186 

Roman Catholic magic, exorcisms, incanta- 
tions, &c, 149, 150, 151 

Roots, Magic power of, 153 

Rose, Plucking a, 106 

Rosicrucian doctrine of Spirits, 67 

Roth, Rudolf, "Litteratur und Geschichte des 
Veda," 54 

Roumanian superstitions, 121, 125 

Rowan tree, charm against witches, 197, 198 

Rules, Infallible, for fortune-telling, 182, 183 

Running water, Divination by means of, 55, 
56 

Rynt, aroint, 199 

S. 

Sacramental bread and wine used by witches 
for sorcery, 149 

Sacrifices, Human, 14, 15 

Sacrifices one of the first results of super- 
natural fear, 5 

Saga, Hervor, Gautrek, Olof Tryggvason's, 

145 

Saints' days and Shamanism, 126 

Salt used in sorcery, 19; salt dreaded by 

devils, 19 
Salves, Magic, 20 



Samovile, or samodivi, 67 

Saxon superstitions, 126 

Scapegoat, Gypsy, 15 

Scent revolver, 139 

Schafarik, " Slawische Alterthumer," Shoe- 
lore legend, 115 

Schlemihl, Peter, 116 

Scholomance (Salamanca), 128 

Schwenki (" Myth, der Slaven "), 29 

Science, Enlarged views in, ix, x 

Scissors or sheaTs in sorcery, 128 

Scotch clergyman, Anecdote of, 118 

Scott, W., "Lady of the Lake," 5;; 

Seventh sons and daughters, 45, 46 

Serpent, Charm against, 35, 38 

Servetus, burned by Calvin, 239 

Seven League Boots, 116 

Shakespeare stafF-rhymes, 43 

Shamanism : its first stage, or witchcraft in a 
rude form, 6 ; Shamanic magic of Tartar 
origin, 8 ; Shamanism, or early witchcraft, 
still the prevalent faith of the lower orders 
in India, 9 ; worship of water, 34, 35 (In- 
cantation), 35 ; Shamanic exorcisms, xiii, 
xiv, Chap. III., 124, 157 

Shaman, The, his origin and influence on 
man, 5 

Shelley, 166 

Shells as amulets and as used in sorcery, 102, 
232, 233, 234, &c. 

Shoe-string, an amulet, 246, 247 

Shoe love-charm, A, 113; Shoe-lore, 1 1 3— 
117 ; symbol of life, 114 

Sights, scents, and tastes by telegraph, 175 

Silver, or a white object, peace, 1 13 

Simeon and Antony, Saints, 126 

Sisnie, St., Invocation to, 36 

Siva, 52 

Skeat, " Et. Diet." 197 

Skidbladnir, 73 

Skogsnufvaz, Swedish fairies, 67 

Skulls of horses and cattle used for charms, 
127, 128 

Snails, Magic and Folk-lore connected with, 
96, 97; incantation to, 223 



27° 



INDEX, 



Somersaults, Turning, to be free from pains 

in the back, 129 
Song conducive to cure, 22 
Songs used in sorcery, 98 . 
Sorceresses in Hungary, 46 
Spiridsui, Spiridush, an attendant spirit, 136 
Spirit of Earth in saffron, 27 
Spirit, Struck by : to cure sore caused by a 

spirit's blow or breath, 20, 21 
Spirits, Elementary, the Vilas-Sylvana, 67 
Sprenger, 240 
Staff-rhymes, 43 
Sta?idard (London), Fetishism from the, xiii, 

xiv 
Stanko, Story of, and the Vila, 68 
St. "James's Gazette on the corpse candle, xiii ; 

on the Hindoo priest, 9 ; scent revolver, 

139; on peacocks, 152 
Stoddard, R. H., 254 
Stokepitch's can, 202 
Stomach, Pains in the, 61, 62 
Stones thrown when a child is born, 135 
Story, W. W., " Castle, St. Angel," 26, 27 
Straw, Straw-lore, 30, 31, 32, 60 
Strega, Strege, 63 
Strix, Strighoi, Streghe, from " stringere," to 

strangle, 135 
Stupidus, or the dumb god, in Latin, German 

and Sanskrit tradition, 104, 105 
Supernatural, First effort of the mind to- 
wards the, xiii ; instinctive creation of, 3 
Superstition allied to religion, xiv ; prevalent 

in all classes, xv 
Swallows, luck-bringing birds, 127, 128 
Swine, Charm to protect, 85, 93 
Swords and knives used by executioners, 230, 

231 
Szegedin, Gypsy in, Story of, 192, 193 



Taboo, 109 

Teeth, cures and charms, 25, 26 
Ten Little Indian Boys, 221 
Tennessee, Inhabitants of, reverting to the 
Red Indian type, 215 



Theodore, a goblin saint, personifies the Sun, 

carries away girls, 126 
Theology, 239, 240 
Thieves, Spell against, 88, 89 
Thistles, against witchcraft, 147, 148 
Thoreau, 188 

Thunderbolts, amulets, 248 
Toad and devil, 253 ; necklace of toads, 257 
Toad and milk-pail, 148 
Toothache, Spell against, 38, 39 
Toricelli, the conjurer, 183 
Towers, Witch, 243, 244 
Tree, Plugging hole in, for magical purposes, 

17 
Trees trained to three branches for luck, 153 j 

Witches meet in the tops of, 152, 153 
Trescone alia Boema, the polka originally 

danced by witches, 159 
Tresevica, Spell of the, 63 
Tribune (New York), on Observation, 172 
Tritas, the Hindoo god, 105 
Trushul, a cross, 52, 54, 153 
Tuckey, C. Lloyd, Dr., " Hypnotism and 

Psycho-Therapeutics," 5, 162 
Twelfth child, Krstnik, 145 
Tyndale, x 
Tyrolese gypsies and amulets, 232, 233 

U. 

Undines, 146 

Unlucky days in Roumania, 125 
Urme, or fairies, 40 ; unfavourable to cattle,. 
86 

V. 

Vairus, de Fascinatione, 46 

Valentine, Mrs., " Nursery Rhymes," 221 

Valkyries, 67 

Vampire, Woman who has had intercourse 

with a, 100 
Varro, 43 

Venetian witchcraft, 1 5 5 
Venus, Paraschiva, 125 
Vikings buried in boats, 114 
Vilas, Slavonian fairies, 67, 143 ; seek the 

love of men, 145, 147 



INDEX. 



27: 



Vine-leaf, Magic, 138 

Voices of the dead heard in a tomb by chil- 
dren, 237 

Volga, Princess, 36 

Volkv, the sorcerer, 36 

Volta, an indecent witch dance, 158 

Voodoo in Philadelphia, 16; Voodoo magic, 
39, 40 ; Owen, Miss Mary, 99 ; how to be- 
come a Voodoo witch (voodoo or taboo), 
109 

W. 

Wallace, x 

Watching children, 136 

Water-boiling to learn who will be the future 
husband, 1 18 

Water-spirits, Homage to, 130 

Wechselbalge, or changelings, 60 

Weird, its true meaning, 43 

Westwood, 162 

Whirlwind, devil dancing with a witch, 128 

Wigan, dual action of the brain, 163 

Willow-knots, love-charms, 139 

Will, Waking, common sense or judgment, 
163 

Winters, The, a gypsy clan, 206 

Witchcraft in England, xiv ; origin of, Chap- 
ter I., 1, 6 ; preceded Shamanism, 6 

Witchcraft in Italy, 155 



Witchcraft, Early, the first form or phase of 
superstition before a cultivated Shamanism, 

124, 157 

Witch doctors, 192 

Witches, Burning, 239 

Witches' foot-prints, 154; their swimming- 
places, 155 

Witches only powers of nature, 156 

Witch, Etymology of the word : names for 
witches, 66 ; signs of a witch, 67 

Witch Walnut-tree of Benevento, 149 

Wlislocki, Dr., Obligations to, xi ; his works, 
xiii, 23, 45, 47, 51, 52, 57, 67, 69, 71, 87, 
91, 94, in, 117, 120, 177, 235 

Wolos, Sting of, charms, 32, 34 

Woman, Old, who lived in a shoe, 1 17 

Women excel in certain qualities, 16 1 

Wordsworth, 166 

Wuch-ow-sen, the eagle, 240 

Wiithende Heer, or Wild Hunter, the storm, 

59 
Wuttke, D., "Deutsche Volks aberglaube der 
Gegenwart," 72 



Zeno, the Terrible Exorcism, 150 
Zigeuner, origin of the word, 30 
Zracne Vile, aerial spirits, 69 



ITIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, CIIILWORTH AND LONDON. 



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